|
--- |
|
layout: transcript |
|
interviewee: sonia none bielski |
|
rg_number: rg-50.030.0025 |
|
pdf_url: https://collections.ushmm.org/oh_findingaids/rg-50.030.0025_trs_en.pdf |
|
ushmm_url: https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn504532 |
|
gender: f |
|
birth_date: 1922-04-15 |
|
birth_year: 1922.0 |
|
place_of_birth: novogrudok |
|
country: poland |
|
experience_group: survivor,partisan |
|
ghetto(s)_encyclopedia: none |
|
ghetto: none |
|
camp(s)_encyclopedia: none |
|
camp: none |
|
non_ss_camp: none |
|
region: none |
|
needs_research: none |
|
data_entry: cl |
|
accession: none |
|
revisit: none |
|
tags: transcripts |
|
--- |
|
<!DOCTYPE html> |
|
|
|
<html lang="en"> |
|
<head> |
|
<meta charset="utf-8"/> |
|
<title>Document</title> |
|
</head> |
|
<body><dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="1">Sonia Boldo Bielski July 11, 1994 </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3">Q: Okay, Sonia, the first thing I want you to do is tell me your full name, and when and where you were born. </sentence><sentence id="4">And then just tell me a little bit about your growing-up years, your <span class="populated place">community</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="7">A: I was born in a small <span class="populated place">town</span> there in <span class="country">Poland</span>, this was a big <span class="populated place">town</span>, <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span>. </sentence><sentence id="8">They had 10 or 15,000 people there. </sentence><sentence id="9">I was born in April 15, 1922, to a very rich father and mother. </sentence></p><p><sentence id="10">Thad four brothers, two older and two younger than me. </sentence><sentence id="11">And I had my education there. </sentence><sentence id="12">I was studying in a <span class="building">liceum</span>, with languages. </sentence><sentence id="13">I finished <span class="building">gimnazjum</span>, and then I went for two years in <span class="building">liceum</span> where I studied Latin, French, Polish, and History. </sentence><sentence id="14">When -- before the war broke out, I was two, three months before finishing my studies. </sentence><sentence id="15">I was dreaming to go to <span class="populated place">Paris</span>, because we had a family there, to study dentistry in <span class="building">Sorbonne</span> with the whole family. </sentence><sentence id="16">My mother's was there. </sentence><sentence id="17">But the war came in, and my dreams finished. </sentence><sentence id="18">The German came to the <span class="populated place">city</span> in December 1941. </sentence><sentence id="19">We didn't know nothing about the war. </sentence><sentence id="20">You know, it was small <span class="populated place">town</span>. </sentence><sentence id="21">We know only that very bad will be for the Jewish people. </sentence><sentence id="22">But we couldn't imagine it should be so, so bad, because when the first German came, they were dancing with us. </sentence><sentence id="23">And one -- I was a pretty girl, and one told my parents, "Make her papers that she is Polish and let her go from the <span class="populated place">city</span>, because it will be very bad." </sentence></p><p><sentence id="24"> And that's what -- when they went, they came, the S.D. and the S.S., and the war began. </sentence></p><p><sentence id="25">In the beginning it was not so bad, because they begin -- After two months, they began to organize the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>. </sentence><sentence id="26">So all the people went out from the <span class="building">houses</span>, and they put us on -- ina small -- in a couple of <span class="building">houses</span>. </sentence><sentence id="27"><span class="building">Pereseka</span>. </sentence><sentence id="28">They're called, <span class="building">Pereseka</span>. </sentence><sentence id="29">This was like <span class="populated place">Brooklyn</span>, <span class="populated place">New York</span>, and <span class="populated place">Queens</span>, like one of the <span class="populated place">city</span>. </sentence><sentence id="30">And we were staying there till they said we have to go out in the <span class="dlf">streets</span>, and this began the Aktion. </sentence><sentence id="31">When the Aktion began, my father saw that is very bad, so he took me, and -- I had a brother -- Jay, and he said, "Come on. </sentence><sentence id="32">I will show you something." </sentence><sentence id="33">And he ran away. </sentence><sentence id="34">He knew the policeman, the Polish, and they let us go. </sentence><sentence id="35">So I ran away to a <span class="populated place">village</span> where my mother was born. </sentence><sentence id="36">And we stayed in a <span class="building">church</span> because my father know there the people. </sentence><sentence id="37">We stayed there about seven days under the <span class="building">church</span>. </sentence><sentence id="38">They had a place in <span class="country">Poland</span> where the potato -- they were holding the potatoes should not freeze. </sentence><sentence id="39">And we staying there for a whole week. </sentence><sentence id="40">He let us stay. </sentence><sentence id="41">It was very nice. </sentence><sentence id="42">And after a week, he said, "The action is gone and you can go to the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>." </sentence><sentence id="43">We didn't know where my mother was. </sentence><sentence id="44">But my mother was a very intelligent girl. </sentence><sentence id="45">She was a rabbi's daughter. </sentence><sentence id="46">And she saw from far that my father went away with me, with my brother. </sentence><sentence id="47">She understood that he will take care, too, on us. </sentence><sentence id="48">So she took care on herself. </sentence><sentence id="49">She run to the <span class="populated place">village</span> where she was born, this was <span class="populated place">Barabevit</span>. </sentence><sentence id="50">And there friends of hers, what she was studying with them in <span class="building">school</span>, he keep her for 10 -- or two weeks. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="51">Q: Was he Jewish or not Jewish? </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="52">A: The friends? </sentence><sentence id="53">Not Jewish, no. </sentence><sentence id="54">The people -- they were very good people, too, not Jewish. </sentence><sentence id="55">Not every Jew is good, too. </sentence><sentence id="56">There is certain people what are better than Jew. </sentence><sentence id="57">They were keeping us, and if they would find them, he would be killed together with his whole family. </sentence><sentence id="58">But he was keeping us. </sentence><sentence id="59">After two weeks, when I was already with my father and brother in the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>, he came in and he said, "You know what, I would like to know if Mr. Boldo is alive." </sentence><sentence id="60">He didn't say that he has my mother. </sentence><sentence id="61">So they said "yes." </sentence><sentence id="62">They let him in. </sentence><sentence id="63">And he said, "You know, I have your wife." </sentence><sentence id="64">This was a shock for us because we were sure that she is not alive. </sentence><sentence id="65">And after a couple of days, she came and she was with us in the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="80">Q: Will you tell me -- go back a little bit to the action and tell me what happened, and how your father got away. </sentence><sentence id="81">I mean, were you right there or did-- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="84">A: We stayed near my father. </sentence><sentence id="85">My father was a tall, strong guy, and everybody knew him. </sentence><sentence id="86">So he sneaked in and he took me and my brother away from the <span class="dlf">line</span>. </sentence><sentence id="87">And you know this small <span class="building">houses</span>, so he keeps us in the <span class="building">house</span> for two hours or three hours till they took away everybody for killing. </sentence><sentence id="88">And we went out. </sentence><sentence id="89">The policemen saw him, but he didn't hold us. </sentence><sentence id="90">They let him go because he knew him from before. </sentence><sentence id="91">He was a Polish policeman. </sentence><sentence id="92">And that's how we survive for the couple of months. </sentence><sentence id="93">After the action, we came back to the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>. </sentence><sentence id="94">We didn't -- we were not hungry because the <span class="populated place">villages</span>, the people, knew that we are there. </sentence><sentence id="95">They were bringing us food, bread, meat, everything. </sentence><sentence id="96">They were beautiful, wonderful people. </sentence><sentence id="97">And till today, we are sending them packages. </sentence><sentence id="98">They are not alive, but we send them packages to give to the kids. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="114">Q: Those -- the first actions, were they for specific people or -- I mean, in your <span class="populated place">town</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="116">A: In our <span class="populated place">town</span>, the first action was before the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>. </sentence><sentence id="117">They took all the doctors, the intelligent people, and they killed them in the <span class="building">marketplace</span> -- 50 of them. </sentence><sentence id="118">They took away the head of the <span class="populated place">city</span>. </sentence><sentence id="119">And then in the month -- in December, this was a regular action for whoever was in the <span class="dlf">street</span> they took. </sentence><sentence id="120">This is the -- first of all, they took the men. </sentence><sentence id="121">They said that they are going to work on a -- work in a <span class="populated place">camp</span>, a <span class="populated place">working camp</span>. </sentence><sentence id="122">But they never came back. </sentence><sentence id="123">Nobody knew about it. </sentence><sentence id="124">But the paysans, that means people from the <span class="populated place">villages</span>, they knew because they saw it. </sentence><sentence id="125">And they were coming to the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span> and they were saying, "There is no <span class="populated place">camp</span>. </sentence><sentence id="126">They are all killed." </sentence><sentence id="127">This was the first action. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="140">Q: That's how your father knew what was happening? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="142">A: Right. </sentence><sentence id="143">Right. </sentence><sentence id="144">He knew everything. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="145">Q: Okay. </sentence><sentence id="146">So you came back to the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>. </sentence><sentence id="147">And then tell me a little bit about living in the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>, and how long you were there, what it was like. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="148">A: We stayed in the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>, I think, a couple of months they came to the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span> -- after the couple of months, this was a regular living. </sentence><sentence id="149">You were working. </sentence><sentence id="150">I was working in the <span class="building">hospital</span>, and the others was working in the <span class="dlf">street</span> because the <span class="dlf">street</span> were bombardment, bombard. </sentence><sentence id="151">Everything was broken, so they were cleaning up. </sentence><sentence id="152">And this was not so bad. </sentence><sentence id="153">Nobody -- they were thinking, you know -- people were thinking what's good is for me. </sentence><sentence id="154">They were thinking, "I will survive. </sentence><sentence id="155">They are not touching us no more." </sentence><sentence id="156">And they were sitting. </sentence><sentence id="157">Then one day, a son of friends of ours came in. </sentence><sentence id="158">And said, "You know what? </sentence><sentence id="159">I saw 11 people from the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span> that went out at night and I know where they went. </sentence><sentence id="160">They went to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, but nobody survived. </sentence><sentence id="161">Because they told them where to go, and the Germans were staying there already and waiting for them." </sentence><sentence id="162">And this was the first group for the trying to went out, and they were killed. </sentence><sentence id="163">So, you know, that's very difficult to go out. </sentence><sentence id="164">We can go out, but we will not be alive. </sentence><sentence id="165">So this was first time. </sentence><sentence id="166">This was -- I think this was already after the winter. </sentence><sentence id="167">The winter was very bad. </sentence><sentence id="168">In <span class="country">Poland</span>, the winter is terrible. </sentence><sentence id="169">So this was probably in March or April another group went out, and we never heard about this. </sentence><sentence id="170">The German came and the they were gave -- they went to segregate the young and the healthy, and they took them to the <span class="building">court</span> there. </sentence><sentence id="171">In <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span>, there was a <span class="building">court</span>. </sentence><sentence id="172">And there in the <span class="building">court</span> they were working, and the rest stayed in the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span> on the <span class="spatial object">Pereseka</span>. </sentence><sentence id="173">There were the kids, the older, and the sick. </sentence><sentence id="174">They didn't kill all of them right away, but after a couple of months, yes. </sentence><sentence id="175">They begin to talking about in the <span class="building">court</span> that something is wrong. </sentence><sentence id="176">They're preparing something, the Germans. </sentence><sentence id="177">Nobody knew what and where. </sentence><sentence id="178">My parents stayed in there, in the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>, in <span class="populated place">Pereseka</span>. </sentence><sentence id="179">And my father said, "I don't want her to be there," to my mother. </sentence><sentence id="180">So they paid. </sentence><sentence id="181">We had money. </sentence><sentence id="182">We had gold. </sentence><sentence id="183">We had many things. </sentence><sentence id="184">And they paid to a Polish man what he was bringing the bread to the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>, to the <span class="building">court</span>. </sentence><sentence id="185">So he paid him. </sentence><sentence id="186">And he bring in -- one night, he bring the bread to the <span class="building">court</span>, and he put me in the <span class="spatial object">basket</span> from the bread. </sentence><sentence id="187">And he brought me to my parents. </sentence><sentence id="188">I was there not a long time, because my parents began to receive letters from the partisan, from my husband, from Alex. </sentence><sentence id="189">And he wrote him -- he didn't know me, I didn't know him. </sentence><sentence id="190">There is a big difference between from the <span class="populated place">village</span>. </sentence><sentence id="191">He was from a <span class="populated place">village</span>, very small, <span class="populated place">Stankiewicze</span>. </sentence><sentence id="192">There were five <span class="building">houses</span>. </sentence><sentence id="193">One of the <span class="building">house</span>, one Jewish family, the Bielskis. </sentence><sentence id="194">And they had, I think, about 10 brothers and two sisters. </sentence><sentence id="195">And his sister was married to uncle of mine, but I never knew him, too. </sentence><sentence id="196">It was great uncle, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="197">And she said -- she was too, in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="198">And she said to him, "You know what, I saw by the Boldos" a beautiful girl, and I would like you to send somebody after her." </sentence><sentence id="199">And he was a very good -- he had two -- he had a wife and a three-month-old child. </sentence><sentence id="200">But he didn't go -- after she gave birth to the child, she didn't want to go to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="201">So this day when he send after her was the liquidation of this <span class="building">house</span>, and she got killed with the child. </sentence><sentence id="202">So he was by himself. </sentence><sentence id="203">And he wrote a letter to my parents that he will guarantee my safety. </sentence><sentence id="204">But I didn't want to go. </sentence><sentence id="205">I was afraid for the <span class="env feature">tree</span>. </sentence><sentence id="206">I was afraid for the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="207">I was afraid for everything because I never were there. </sentence><sentence id="208">But when my parents saw what is here, they said, "Listen, I want you to go. </sentence><sentence id="209">I would like you -- better to die there than I would see you dead here." </sentence><sentence id="210">And he send a couple of men with rifles. </sentence><sentence id="211">And at night, my father paid again to the police, Polish. </sentence><sentence id="212">And I went out with the friend of mine, Leah, to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="213">I came there -- we went out there about 12 o'clock, we came there about four o'clock, to the <span class="env feature">forest</span> where we saw already about 18 people with rifles. </sentence><sentence id="214">I was afraid of them, too. </sentence><sentence id="215">I was not used to that, but I got used to that. </sentence><sentence id="216">And then I met my husband. </sentence><sentence id="217">So it was very nice in the morning, about 6 o'clock in the morning, my friends Chaya" that was already the girlfriends from mine other brother-in-law, Asael", She said, "You know, I have a commander and I am with him and I am very happy." </sentence><sentence id="218">I said to her -- I was looking on her -- and I said, "Can you tell me maybe there's another commander?" </sentence><sentence id="219">She said, "Yes. </sentence><sentence id="220">One is Alex, his brother, the younger." </sentence><sentence id="221">I said, "Who is he? </sentence><sentence id="222">Where is he?" </sentence><sentence id="223">She said, "Don't worry. </sentence><sentence id="224">About seven o'clock you will see him." </sentence><sentence id="225">And really about seven o'clock I saw a man with rifles, all over. </sentence><sentence id="226">I saw a man, a giant. </sentence><sentence id="227">He was six-two, and a young handsome -- I had afraid of him, too. </sentence><sentence id="228">But life is life. </sentence><sentence id="229">After -- He was very good to me from the beginning. </sentence><sentence id="230">He was very good to me. </sentence><sentence id="231">And he said to me, "You know, you came here. </sentence><sentence id="232">I would like you to stay with me." </sentence><sentence id="233">I said, "You know what, I will stay with you, but I want you to take out my parents." </sentence><sentence id="234">And I made with him like, "You know, you have to take them out, then I will stay with you." </sentence><sentence id="235">And it took him all about seven or six days and my parents came. </sentence><sentence id="236">After my parents came, after a day, the whole <span class="populated place">ghetto</span> went in flames. </sentence><sentence id="237">But I came to the <span class="env feature">forest</span> end of August. </sentence><sentence id="238">August 15 was the second Aktion. </sentence><sentence id="239">And my brother died there, got killed. </sentence><sentence id="240">He didn't get killed in the action, but he saw that they were taking away my mother. </sentence><sentence id="241">My father was staying with me. </sentence><sentence id="242">So he went to work. </sentence><sentence id="243">My mother, so he wanted to take care on her. </sentence><sentence id="244">So he took her out from the <span class="dlf">lines</span>, dead, to the <span class="dlf">lines</span> of living. </sentence><sentence id="245">You understand what I am talking? </sentence><sentence id="246">And the German -- the people were counted. </sentence><sentence id="247">And he knew that somebody is missing, but he couldn't give out my mother. </sentence><sentence id="248">So they took him in on the <span class="spatial object">truck</span>, but he was killed when he was running from the <span class="spatial object">truck</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="350">Q: They were doing a selection? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="352">A: Selection, sure. </sentence><sentence id="353">Sure, a selection. </sentence><sentence id="354">This was August 15, and in this selection my brother was -- got killed. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="358">Q: August 15, "42? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="360">A: Forty-two. </sentence><sentence id="361">In this selection, my brother was killed. </sentence><sentence id="362">That was my youngest brother and he was 17, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="363">That's it. </sentence><sentence id="364">Then my mother said, "You have to go." </sentence><sentence id="365">When the bread came " Leah Berkowski > Chaya Bielski 3 <span class="building">Asael Bielski</span> in, he took me to my parents. </sentence><sentence id="366">This was after August 15. </sentence><sentence id="367">He send -- my husband send a letter and I went away to the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>. </sentence><sentence id="368">That -- what I met him, in the morning, seven o'clock in the morning. </sentence><sentence id="369">And whatever he promise, he delivered. </sentence><sentence id="370">He delivered my parents. </sentence><sentence id="371">He took care very well on them. </sentence><sentence id="372">My mother was very fragile, but in the wintertime, she wouldn't stay in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="373">So he took all these men and they were putting her every day in another <span class="building">house</span> by the, by the <span class="populated place">villages</span>. </sentence><sentence id="374">And she survived the winter. </sentence><sentence id="375">In the summertime she went to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="395">Q: So, talk to me a little bit about. ... </sentence><sentence id="396">Should we tell people to be quite? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="399"> [Technical conversation] </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="401">Q: Tell me -- You know, it's unusual, this situation where a tremendous number of the people, the peasants and maybe even the people in the <span class="populated place">towns</span> helped, but also there were collaborators. </sentence><sentence id="402">So tell me a little bit about how that worked? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="405">A: The people from our <span class="populated place">city</span>, they were very good to us. </sentence><sentence id="406">They knew us. </sentence><sentence id="407">And when the German came, my father and mother give away everything to the people. </sentence><sentence id="408">So they took care on us. </sentence><sentence id="409">And they were very nice, because their life was the same thing, in jeopardy like our life. </sentence><sentence id="410">And they did everything. </sentence><sentence id="411">And they were very good. </sentence><sentence id="412">I know after the war when I came to the <span class="populated place">city</span>, to the <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="413">They recognize me right away, and they said "Sonia, tell me what you need." </sentence><sentence id="414">And to my parents the same thing. </sentence><sentence id="415">They give the first food. </sentence><sentence id="416">They said, "You can stay with us." </sentence><sentence id="417">They were very nice. </sentence><sentence id="418">They were people, beautiful. </sentence><sentence id="419">If not the people nobody survive, too. </sentence><sentence id="420">They gave us help. </sentence><sentence id="421">You cannot tell that everybody was very bad, but there were people very good, too. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="439">Q: This situation where the actions happened, and they happened, small actions, but many, many. </sentence><sentence id="440">And the news spread of them, that's somewhat unusual. </sentence><sentence id="441">There were a lot of <span class="region">areas</span> where people didn't know what was happening. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="445">A: No, nobody knew. </sentence><sentence id="446">In the morning, they came about six o'clock when the people are going to work and they right away they took them to the <span class="spatial object">trucks</span>, so how did you know? </sentence><sentence id="447">You didn't know nothing. </sentence><sentence id="448">When you knew, already it was too late. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="453">Q: When you got taken out of the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span> and went to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, when was that? </sentence><sentence id="454">Was that August or was that in the Spring? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="457">A: This was end of August, beginning of September. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="459">Q: Okay. </sentence><sentence id="460">Do you know about a man named Anton Schmidt? </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="461">A: Schmidt? </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="462">Q: Yeah. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="464">A: No. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="466">Q: He was a rescuer who was executed in April. </sentence><sentence id="467">I was going to ask you about him. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="470">A: No, I don't know. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="472">Q: Okay. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="474">A: I know about <span class="populated place">Kozlowski</span>". </sentence><sentence id="475">Kozlowski. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="478">Q: Tell me. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="480">A: <span class="populated place">Kozlowksi</span> was a wonderful man. </sentence><sentence id="481">He born not far from my husband's <span class="populated place">village</span>. </sentence><sentence id="482">He were coming -- He went to the German, to the Polish, and he will bring all of the news to the brother Bielskis. </sentence><sentence id="483">They knew everything. </sentence><sentence id="484">If you need something, medicine or something, he went to the <span class="populated place">city</span> and he bought it, or stole it, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="485">But the medicine we got. </sentence><sentence id="486">We got the salt and the sugar, whatever we needed from him. </sentence><sentence id="487">He was wonderful. </sentence><sentence id="488">Now the children become -- his children are alive and we are sending them money and packages and everything. </sentence><sentence id="489">He was one from the first. </sentence><sentence id="490">But he was bringing us everything. </sentence><sentence id="491">I know about him, because if somebody came from the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span> -- people were coming from the <span class="populated place">ghettos</span> -- they didn't know where to go. </sentence><sentence id="492">So the first <span class="building">house</span> was Kozlowksi's <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="493">So he was keeping them. </sentence><sentence id="494">And he said, "Don't worry, somebody will come and they will take you to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>." </sentence><sentence id="495">They were beautiful people. </sentence><sentence id="496">You don't have to forget this. </sentence><sentence id="497">You cannot say that everybody was bad. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="516">Q: Tell me what it was like in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="517">Tell me about the setting up of the <span class="populated place">community</span>, and tell me how it changed from that first -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="520">A: When I came into the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, they had only 75 people. </sentence><sentence id="521">That was the group of the Bielskis brothers. </sentence><sentence id="522">That was the four brothers -- the three brothers and they had their brother, Aaron, 13 years old. </sentence><sentence id="523">And they have a sister, what she was married to Chaya's brother. </sentence><sentence id="524">So that was the <span class="building">Bielskis</span> and the <span class="building">Dzienciolskis</span>. </sentence><sentence id="525">This was the whole thing. </sentence><sentence id="526">But later came another seven men and they made 70 people, 70 or 80 people, when I came in. </sentence><sentence id="527">This was the beginning of the partisans because people were -- went away from the <span class="env feature">forest</span> -- went away from the <span class="populated place">ghettos</span>. </sentence><sentence id="528">They didn't have a place there. </sentence><sentence id="529">And they -- the <span class="dlf">doors</span> from the <span class="building">Bielskis brother</span> were open for everybody, for old, children, sick people. </sentence><sentence id="530">And they had always food. </sentence><sentence id="531">They didn't 4 <span class="building">Konstanty Kozlowski</span> have steaks, but they have bread and water. </sentence><sentence id="532">They were very good. </sentence><sentence id="533">They were no different, but later, then many people came in. </sentence><sentence id="534">So there were men that said, "Listen, why do I have to go and grab food and risk my life? </sentence><sentence id="535">My wife is not here, my children are not here. </sentence><sentence id="536">Why should I risk the life for them?" </sentence><sentence id="537">But the Bielskis brother said, "Everybody who is coming has to have a place here. </sentence><sentence id="538">And eerybody will have a piece of bread." </sentence><sentence id="539">They will not have maybe something else, but bread they will give everybody. </sentence><sentence id="540">This was one <span class="interior space">kitchen</span>, one big <span class="interior space">kitchen</span> and they were cooking potatoes with a piece of bread. </sentence><sentence id="541">And this was the food. </sentence><sentence id="542">Later, when the people came in more and more, they went out and knew that the Germans were in this <span class="populated place">village</span>. </sentence><sentence id="543">And the German came into the <span class="populated place">village</span> and knew they will collect bread and butter and milk and meat, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="544">So we were putting ambushes -- ambush is that the right word? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="571">Q: Uh-huh. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="573">A: ...and they were taking away the food from them. </sentence><sentence id="574">And that's what we had the food for the partisans. </sentence><sentence id="575">We made ambush on them and got their rifles. </sentence><sentence id="576">We got everything from them. </sentence><sentence id="577">Nobody was sending us. </sentence><sentence id="578">They were killing the German. </sentence><sentence id="579">They took away the food, took away the rifles, and we were in business. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="587">Q: Do you know about -- I think it was probably soon after you came -- the big harvest, when the Germans were going to get a percentage of the harvest, and so they burned the -- tell me about that. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="589">A: The <span class="populated place">villages</span> told us everything. </sentence><sentence id="590">Not us, to the Bielskis brother. </sentence><sentence id="591">They were afraid of them, terrible. </sentence><sentence id="592">One cannot fight, but if you three brothers, six-two with rifles and you knew you cannot live, you knew that he will touch something, whatever, you will not do the right thing, they will be killed. </sentence><sentence id="593">So they did everything. </sentence><sentence id="594">They were telling us that in a couple of days they have to pay to the German so much and so much. </sentence><sentence id="595">Not in money, but in food. </sentence><sentence id="596">So the Bielskis knew that the food is coming. </sentence><sentence id="597">The <span class="populated place">villages</span> are giving them. </sentence><sentence id="598">We need it, too, the food. </sentence><sentence id="599">So that's what we took away. </sentence><sentence id="600">That was the harvest. </sentence><sentence id="601">That's what you mean, right? </sentence><sentence id="602">And we took away and we told to the <span class="populated place">villages</span>, remember one thing, you giving them because you don't want, because Germans, too, they were killing them. </sentence><sentence id="603">They were killing them. </sentence><sentence id="604">They put everything on a fire and they went away. </sentence><sentence id="605">So you have to give them, half them and half to us. </sentence></p><p><sentence id="606">And that's what they did. </sentence><sentence id="607">They were not always friendly, because you see, there were Aktions. </sentence><sentence id="608">The <span class="building">Bielskis</span> were fighters. </sentence><sentence id="609">Not everybody, but they had a group of fighters. </sentence><sentence id="610">They had, the beginning, they had about 50 fighters. </sentence><sentence id="611">Later, the number went up and up and up. </sentence></p><p><sentence id="612">And they were not only fighting with the Polish police, they were fighting between the partisans, too. </sentence><sentence id="613">They were Polish -- not Polish, but German partisan -- German -- Russian partisans. </sentence><sentence id="614">They were against us, too. </sentence><sentence id="615">First of all, because we were Jews. </sentence><sentence id="616">Second, because we knew better the <span class="populated place">neighborhood</span> and we knew the people. </sentence><sentence id="617">So this was a plus, a big plus for us. </sentence></p><p><sentence id="618">And they were saying that we are taking away all of the food. </sentence><sentence id="619">Remember 1,000 people in the beginning. </sentence><sentence id="620">You have to feed them. </sentence><sentence id="621">And they were not sitting all of them in one place. </sentence><sentence id="622">We had afraid for that. </sentence><sentence id="623">So in groups, this was about 20 people in groups, they were sitting in the summertime up. </sentence><sentence id="624">In the wintertime, we had under the -- underground they were sitting. </sentence><sentence id="625">And when you are in the <span class="env feature">snow</span>, every little thing you can see. </sentence><sentence id="626">So we were very careful, but you know you cannot take away from the <span class="populated place">villages</span>. </sentence><sentence id="627">They knew very good. </sentence></p><p><sentence id="628"> The Bielskis knew the place, but they knew, too. </sentence><sentence id="629">So we have to be in peace with them. </sentence><sentence id="630">You cannot take away everything. </sentence><sentence id="631">You have to leave them, too, for the family, something. </sentence><sentence id="632">But we managed. </sentence><sentence id="633">We managed. </sentence><sentence id="634">In the wintertime, I never were in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="635">I was always -- it's called a <span class="building">hutor</span>. </sentence><sentence id="636">This mean a <span class="dlf">farm</span> from one <span class="building">house</span> or two <span class="building">houses</span>. </sentence><sentence id="637">So I went with my husband and another 15 people. </sentence><sentence id="638">They were riders. </sentence><sentence id="639">And went there, sleep over about four or three hours and we went back to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="640">But they were very good to us. </sentence><sentence id="641">I cannot say it. </sentence><sentence id="642">Nobody would survive if not the people from the <span class="populated place">villages</span>. </sentence><sentence id="643">They had afraid, but they give us whatever we needed. </sentence><sentence id="644">Later, already in -- this was in "43. </sentence><sentence id="645">In "44, we got already the rifles and everything from <span class="populated place">Moscow</span>. </sentence><sentence id="646">They were sending us by <span class="spatial object">planes</span>. </sentence><sentence id="647">And they were bigger commanders than the <span class="building">Bielskis</span>. </sentence><sentence id="648">They were commanders what they put on the front from the Russians, from <span class="populated place">Moscow</span>. </sentence><sentence id="649">And they were good. </sentence><sentence id="650">They said to us like that. </sentence><sentence id="651">We were complaining always. </sentence><sentence id="652">You know, they have took a group of ours, 14 people. </sentence><sentence id="653">They took away their rifles, took away their food, and let them go without shoes even. </sentence><sentence id="654">They said, "Remember Mr. Bielski -- brother Bielski, remember one thing, this is life. </sentence><sentence id="655">You have to fight for them -- for that." </sentence><sentence id="656">Not once my husband -- My husband was always between the German and the Polish army. </sentence><sentence id="657">The Polish, they were working together with the German, the Kozaks. </sentence><sentence id="658">He was always on the horses. </sentence><sentence id="659">He was giving everything to the all partisan and from the <span class="building">Naliboki puszeza</span>. </sentence><sentence id="660">You know what is a <span class="populated place">puszcza</span>, <span class="populated place">puszcza</span> is the biggest <span class="env feature">forest</span>, you cannot live there. </sentence></p><p><sentence id="661">This is only for the animals. </sentence><sentence id="662">This is not far from <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span>. </sentence><sentence id="663">This was between <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span> and <span class="populated place">Minsk</span>. </sentence><sentence id="664">But we were there in the beginning. </sentence><sentence id="665">And they couldn't find us because you have to go by foot or by horses. </sentence><sentence id="666">They were afraid. </sentence><sentence id="667">They cannot go with the <span class="spatial object">tanks</span> there. </sentence><sentence id="668">They were surrounding us and we heard them talking and shooting. </sentence><sentence id="669">And we were sitting on <span class="env feature">mud</span> without food for 10, for 12 days, till my husband -- I am telling you everything in one story -- till my husband said, "They cannot take no more hunger." </sentence><sentence id="670">This was the only brother he said, "I cannot -- I have to go fight myself." </sentence><sentence id="671">So he took 150 people -- not 150, 90 people, and I was, too, in the group by my husband, and he opened the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence></p><p><sentence id="672">We come in after the German who saw the fire still burning. </sentence><sentence id="673">They were warming the food, but nobody touch it. </sentence><sentence id="674">When we went out to open the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, after a day, another 100 people went out and another hundred people because the Germans left us alone and we went away from there. </sentence><sentence id="675">And then we went to get organized again. </sentence><sentence id="676">This was the life. </sentence><sentence id="677">We were fighting them not in the open. </sentence><sentence id="678">You cannot fight a German soldier in the open. </sentence><sentence id="679">We were surrounding them. </sentence><sentence id="680">We know where they are and we were fighting them and took off everything from them. </sentence><sentence id="681">And that's what this was life of the partisan. </sentence><sentence id="682">Not only us, there were the Russian partisan. </sentence><sentence id="683">The same thing, they were fighting, not in the open <span class="dlf">field</span>, because in the open <span class="dlf">field</span> you got killed from them. </sentence><sentence id="684">They had better everything. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="685">Q: So you hid in the <span class="env feature">woods</span> and waited till they came? </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="686">A: Yes. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="688">Q: And when you rode with your husband, that time when you first left the thick <span class="env feature">forest</span>, were you carrying a gun, too? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="690">A: Yeah, I had a gun. </sentence><sentence id="691">I had always a gun. </sentence><sentence id="692">But I never shoot the gun, no. </sentence><sentence id="693">When I was with my husband, I was not afraid of nothing, nothing at all. </sentence><sentence id="694">But when I didn't see him, I was afraid of everything. </sentence><sentence id="695">I had a gun for myself, for my protection. </sentence><sentence id="696">He gave it to me. </sentence><sentence id="697">Nothing else. </sentence><sentence id="698">This is it. [ </sentence><sentence id="699">had a very good life in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="700">He gave to me everything. </sentence><sentence id="701">I never cooked. </sentence><sentence id="702">I never did nothing. </sentence><sentence id="703">I was the commander's wife. </sentence><sentence id="704">You met my sister-in-law, Lilly. </sentence><sentence id="705">There were three brothers. </sentence><sentence id="706">The oldest was <span class="building">Tuvia</span>. </sentence><sentence id="707">You know, in a small <span class="populated place">villages</span> in small <span class="populated place">cities</span>, the older brother is the head of the family. </sentence><sentence id="708">And when they got together, they put him, Asael, his older brother, and Zusia", they made him a hero. </sentence><sentence id="709">They made him the head of the partisan. </sentence><sentence id="710">He was a very nice man. </sentence><sentence id="711">They, all of them, they were very nice. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="734">Q: If they hadn't been there do you think that things would have worked out the way they did? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="736">A: Never. </sentence><sentence id="737">Never. </sentence><sentence id="738">Nobody knew the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="739">They were born there. </sentence><sentence id="740">They were born in a small <span class="populated place">village</span>, and they knew the <span class="env feature">forest</span> and they knew the people. </sentence><sentence id="741">They knew everything. </sentence><sentence id="742">How could I survive, or somebody else? </sentence><sentence id="743">All 1,200 people, nobody would survive. </sentence><sentence id="744">Because there were people from other <span class="populated place">city</span>, too, not only from <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span>, from <span class="populated place">Lida</span>, from <span class="populated place">Baranovichi</span>, from <span class="populated place">Vilna</span> -- the people never were in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="745">You know, Jewish people, they are not going to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="746">They are in the <span class="populated place">city</span>. </sentence><sentence id="747">Only they survived because of the Bielskis brothers. </sentence><sentence id="748">I cannot say because of Tuvia, because of Asael, because of Zusia. </sentence><sentence id="749">No, the three of them, they were one. </sentence><sentence id="750">Because nobody did something where the other one didn't want it. </sentence><sentence id="751">All of them, they work together. </sentence><sentence id="752">Whatever they had between them, nobody knew, but they were together. </sentence><sentence id="753">And that is what we survived. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="772">Q: How do you think they knew that the only way to survive was to go to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="774">A: Their instinct, instinct. </sentence><sentence id="775">You know, when you are born in a <span class="populated place">village</span>, yes, you think that is the whole world. </sentence><sentence id="776">That is the whole world for them, for the people. </sentence><sentence id="777">They knew that if they would go to the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span> they will get killed because once Tuvia got to the <span class="populated place">city</span> to take something and they took him. </sentence><sentence id="778">The German took him, hit him so, so much. </sentence><sentence id="779">And he -- I don't know how he survived. </sentence><sentence id="780">At night we were sitting, and he said, "What I am sitting? </sentence><sentence id="781">What am I waiting for?" </sentence><sentence id="782">And he ran away to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="783">The first in the <span class="env feature">forest</span> was my husband and his brother, Asael. </sentence><sentence id="784">How come the first? </sentence><sentence id="785">My husband, when the German came, he was in the Russian army. </sentence><sentence id="786">They took him. </sentence><sentence id="787">You know, the Russian, when they came in "39, they were taking the young > Aleksander Bielski people to the army for work, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="788">So he was in the army. </sentence><sentence id="789">But he saw on the <span class="dlf">road</span> going <span class="building">home</span>, he said that was terrible. </sentence><sentence id="790">Whoever came and they were asking him, "Are you a Jew, or you are Polish?" </sentence><sentence id="791">whatever, they got killed. </sentence><sentence id="792">So he said "no." </sentence><sentence id="793">He was speaking very nicely Russian and speaks beautiful Polish. </sentence><sentence id="794">And He doesn't look like a Jew, he looks like a Russian. </sentence><sentence id="795">So he said that he will not get in the Russian -- in the German and that's what he did. </sentence><sentence id="796">He came <span class="building">home</span> at night. </sentence><sentence id="797">He was in <span class="populated place">Bialystok</span> in the army there. </sentence><sentence id="798">He came at night. </sentence><sentence id="799">He was swollen in the legs and everything. </sentence><sentence id="800">So his mother said to him, "Stay for a couple of days <span class="building">home</span>." </sentence><sentence id="801">He said, "No, Mother. </sentence><sentence id="802">I am not staying. </sentence><sentence id="803">I will stay in the <span class="env feature">forest</span> near the <span class="building">house</span>." </sentence><sentence id="804">And that's what happened, because in this time when she said to him, "stay in the <span class="building">house</span>," and they came in the morning and took away his mother and his father and two brothers. </sentence><sentence id="805">And they never see the light of the day. </sentence><sentence id="806">And they were sitting not far away. </sentence><sentence id="807">And by now the girlfriends -- he had a girlfriends, a Polish, and she made a place for him in the <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="808">So the first to went to the <span class="env feature">forest</span> was my husband and his brother, Asael. </sentence><sentence id="809">When they were already in <span class="env feature">forest</span>, then came <span class="populated place">Tuvia</span>. </sentence><sentence id="810">This was -- didn't take a long time, probably about a week or two. </sentence><sentence id="811">So and they had a sister in another <span class="populated place">village</span>, <span class="populated place">Tajba</span>. </sentence><sentence id="812">She was married to the <span class="building">Dzienciolski</span>. </sentence><sentence id="813">When they heard about the German, the whole Dzienciolski family ran away and they left her with a small baby in the <span class="building">house</span>, the sister, Tajba. </sentence><sentence id="814">So my husband went and he took her out with the baby to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="815">She had the baby of nine months. </sentence><sentence id="816">She is still alive today. </sentence><sentence id="817">And they went in the morning to the people -- they didn't have children. </sentence><sentence id="818">And they said, "Listen, at night" -- This was wintertime already -- "at night I will bring my sister's daughter, Lola.deg Please take care. </sentence><sentence id="819">If you will not take care and something happen to her, you will not be alive." </sentence><sentence id="820">And that's what happened. </sentence><sentence id="821">He put -- my husband, he put the baby onto the <span class="dlf">door</span>. </sentence><sentence id="822">It was winter. </sentence><sentence id="823">And they were watching and they didn't hear nothing. </sentence><sentence id="824">They were sure that the baby is already in the <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="825">They forgot about it. </sentence><sentence id="826">So the baby was already frozen when they took her into the <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="827">And they took care on her. </sentence><sentence id="828">And they said, "God sent us a baby daughter." </sentence><sentence id="829">And they took care till after she was three years. </sentence><sentence id="830">They didn't want to give her back after the war. </sentence><sentence id="831">No. </sentence><sentence id="832">But you know they took away and they appreciate very much, too. </sentence><sentence id="833">The daughter is alive. </sentence><sentence id="834">She is now 50 something. </sentence><sentence id="835">And last year, she was there and she saw not the family -- the family's dead already -- but the children of the family. </sentence><sentence id="836">And this is -- she is alive today. </sentence><sentence id="837">That's it. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="903">Q: Let's talk about the <span class="populated place">community</span> in the <span class="env feature">forest</span> and when it got big, and the <span class="building">ziemlankas</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="905">A: <span class="building">Ziemlanka</span>", <span class="building">ziemlanka</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="907">Q: Tell me about building those for the winter. </sentence><sentence id="908">Tell me how they were made and how many there were and who stayed in them, and what they were used for. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="911"> deg <span class="building">Lola Dzienciolski</span> </sentence></p><p><sentence id="912"> 7 <span class="building">Earthen hut</span> (Yiddish) </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="913">A: I never stayed there. </sentence><sentence id="914">I went only to visit, because I had my parents there. </sentence><sentence id="915">This was for families, for sick folk, for children, for old. </sentence><sentence id="916">They had two fighters, because they went for food. </sentence><sentence id="917">And they stayed there the <span class="building">ziemlankas</span> -- they called them <span class="building">ziemlankas</span> -- for the winter. </sentence><sentence id="918">It was like small <span class="interior space">rooms</span>. </sentence><sentence id="919">And many -- this was one <span class="dlf">row</span> with <span class="building">houses</span>, second <span class="interior space">row</span>, third one. </sentence><sentence id="920">They had a <span class="building">factory</span>. </sentence><sentence id="921">They made there -- bakers they had -- they had bread they made. </sentence><sentence id="922">They made other foods. </sentence><sentence id="923">They made for the <span class="spatial object">saddles</span> for the horses. </sentence><sentence id="924">They made boots for people. </sentence><sentence id="925">And the Russian partisans, they were coming there. </sentence><sentence id="926">They were living there. </sentence><sentence id="927">They had a good dinner there, because you know, you had already everything. </sentence><sentence id="928">The people were giving you, because they had afraid of their lives. </sentence><sentence id="929">And they didn't give. </sentence><sentence id="930">So they send people out, and the people was bringing. </sentence><sentence id="931">They were not hungry. </sentence><sentence id="932">They had about 1,000 people. </sentence><sentence id="933">My husband was always in between the German and the Polish police. </sentence><sentence id="934">He never stayed there, he came only to visit them. </sentence><sentence id="935">So it was about 100 miles away from us. </sentence><sentence id="936">This was the big <span class="building">puszeza</span>, <span class="populated place">Naliboki</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="961">Q: How long did that <span class="populated place">community</span> exist? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="963">A: This was staying till the end, till the end. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="965">Q: From -- but when did it start? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="967">A: It started after the Germans surrendered there. </sentence><sentence id="968">It was in "43, I think, they surrendered there. </sentence><sentence id="969">And we were not still there, we were on in the raj on(r). </sentence><sentence id="970">That mean between the <span class="building">houses</span>. </sentence><sentence id="971">Between the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, the small <span class="env feature">forest</span>, not big. </sentence><sentence id="972">And got killed, a couple, and I think five or six people got killed. </sentence><sentence id="973">And then we didn't have already a place there. </sentence><sentence id="974">It was too many. </sentence><sentence id="975">So we went to the <span class="dlf">Naliboki puszcza</span>. </sentence><sentence id="976">And there we were settled and built the <span class="building">houses</span> and the <span class="building">ziemlankas</span> and the <span class="building">factories</span> and the <span class="building">bakeries</span> and everything. </sentence><sentence id="977">And the Ge-- and the Russian partisan came to us and they took, they took boots, they took for the horses, whatever they need to drive, too, saddles. </sentence><sentence id="978">And they were very happy with us. </sentence><sentence id="979">They had a good time with us there. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="993">Q: And you gave them -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="995">A: We gave them everything. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="997">Q: .. anything they wanted? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="999">A: Everything you wanted. </sentence><sentence id="1000">Everything, because they were higher than us. </sentence><sentence id="1001">There in the <span class="dlf">puszcza</span>, they had like people what they would send from <span class="populated place">Moscow</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1002">And this you had to give it to him. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1007">Q: But you were respected, the <span class="building">Bielskis</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1009">A: Oh, they were respected all over. </sentence><sentence id="1010">They were respect very much, because when they heard * <span class="region">area</span> (Polish) that the German are making, they wanted to surrender <span class="populated place">puszcza</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1011">They called right the Bielski brothers and they said, "What to do, how can you help us?" </sentence><sentence id="1012">They wanted to take away Asael and wanted to take away Zusia -- Alex, and Asael didn't want to go. </sentence><sentence id="1013">And Zusia went because he saw that we have no other way. </sentence><sentence id="1014">So he took 150 people, but they were only the fighters. </sentence><sentence id="1015">And they put him in a new <span class="dlf">otriad</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1016">This mean a new partisan. </sentence><sentence id="1017">They called <span class="populated place">Ordzonikidze</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1018">And he was bringing them to <span class="populated place">Platon</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1019">Platon was the head of all partisan. </sentence><sentence id="1020">He was bringing all of the news, my husband was, like, you know, intell- -- like -- You know what I mean? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1034">Q: Intelligence. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1036">A: Intelligence, right. </sentence><sentence id="1037">He was the intelligence. </sentence><sentence id="1038">And you were bringing him everything. </sentence><sentence id="1039">And that is what we stayed -- not in the <span class="dlf">puszcza</span>, he stayed always but five or four miles from the German, four or two miles from the police, the Polish. </sentence><sentence id="1040">And were always fighting. </sentence><sentence id="1041">Always. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1048">Q: Did you and your husband trust General Platon or -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1050">A: Not always. </sentence><sentence id="1051">Not always. </sentence><sentence id="1052">But remember, he was a very tough guy, my husband. </sentence><sentence id="1053">He was -- till he went out, he would send the people to see if this is correct. </sentence><sentence id="1054">But we didn't have too many things that they said to us that's true and was not true. </sentence><sentence id="1055">Maybe a couple of times, but not too many. </sentence><sentence id="1056">They had afraid of them. </sentence><sentence id="1057">They had one partisan Victor Panchenko. </sentence><sentence id="1058">He was a Russian commander. </sentence><sentence id="1059">He began the partisan when the Russian people -- the soldier run away from the German, so he had the couple, and he began to be bigger and bigger and bigger. </sentence><sentence id="1060">He was fighting us, too, in the beginning. </sentence><sentence id="1061">Because he said, "You taking away everything; there is nothing for me." </sentence><sentence id="1062">But they made it okay. </sentence><sentence id="1063">If they will take about 50 -- sometimes Tuvia and Asael sent out about 15, 20 people for bread. </sentence><sentence id="1064">So the Russian partisan, they were taking away the bread. </sentence><sentence id="1065">The were taiking aywat the bread and the salt. </sentence><sentence id="1066">They were taking away the shoes and rifles. </sentence><sentence id="1067">And we came in on that action where they took away everything. </sentence><sentence id="1068">I came in with my husband. </sentence><sentence id="1069">I was -- I didn't go always with him, but this time I went with him. </sentence><sentence id="1070">And he saw that everything, the horses stays, he said, "Where are the people? </sentence><sentence id="1071">Where are Tuvia's partisan?" </sentence><sentence id="1072">He said, "They are in the <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1073">They took away everything from them. </sentence><sentence id="1074">Panchenko people took away everything from them." </sentence><sentence id="1075">He went into the <span class="building">house</span>, and he said, "Who gave it to you? </sentence><sentence id="1076">Who gave it to you the right to take away everything from them?" </sentence><sentence id="1077">So they put the rifles to my husband. </sentence><sentence id="1078">And he took right away the gun and said, "Come on. </sentence><sentence id="1079">Come on, we will fight." </sentence><sentence id="1080">After 15, 10 minutes, another Russian partisan came in and said, "Okay. </sentence><sentence id="1081">That is nothing. </sentence><sentence id="1082">Come on. </sentence><sentence id="1083">Take away everything." </sentence><sentence id="1084">They give him away everything, because they had afraid. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1120">Q: How did they work that out? </sentence><sentence id="1121">How did it end up working out that -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1124">A: The Russian and the Jewish partisan? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1126">Q: Yeah. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1127">A: They have places, and they said, "Let's divide this. </sentence><sentence id="1128">The <span class="region">west</span> is yours, the <span class="region">east</span> is ours." </sentence><sentence id="1129">And that's what they are fighting. </sentence><sentence id="1130">You cannot go in all the places yourself because you have to give a chance to the other one, too. </sentence><sentence id="1131">And then it was quiet. </sentence><sentence id="1132">They were coming to the <span class="dlf">puszcza</span>, and it was good. </sentence><sentence id="1133">They were drinking vodka, they were eating. </sentence><sentence id="1134">And everything was, again, in order. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1135">Q: Tell me about the friction with the other partisans because the Bielskis took in children, the old people, people who couldn't carry guns. </sentence><sentence id="1136">Tell me about that. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1139">A: I remember today there was a time that too many people came in. </sentence><sentence id="1140">They were sick, and old, and children. </sentence><sentence id="1141">So the other two brothers said, "Listen, we are taking too many. </sentence><sentence id="1142">What will be the end? </sentence><sentence id="1143">Now is summer, is not too bad, in the winter" -- so Tuvia said like that, "I don't care. </sentence><sentence id="1144">I have to give place to everybody." </sentence><sentence id="1145">The other partisans, they didn't want them, because when -- if somebody was going away from the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span> and you were a Jew, sometimes they were killing them. </sentence><sentence id="1146">They took away the boots. </sentence><sentence id="1147">They were killing them. </sentence><sentence id="1148">They took whatever they had. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1159">Q: You mean the partisans? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1161">A: The partisans, yes. </sentence><sentence id="1162">But once they took away and somebody told us, so they did the same thing to the Russian. </sentence><sentence id="1163">And they stopped. </sentence><sentence id="1164">They said, "What are you doing? </sentence><sentence id="1165">What are you doing? </sentence><sentence id="1166">What for you need these people, they can't bring nothing." </sentence><sentence id="1167">But we did -- the <span class="building">Bielskis</span> didn't listen to them. </sentence><sentence id="1168">They took in everybody. </sentence><sentence id="1169">This was like the angels. </sentence><sentence id="1170">Where would I go, and hundreds of me? </sentence><sentence id="1171">I didn't know where to go. </sentence><sentence id="1172">I didn't know the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1173">I even didn't know how to take care of nothing. </sentence><sentence id="1174">I was sitting maybe -- there were people were sitting under the <span class="env feature">tree</span> and waiting somebody should come to take them. </sentence><sentence id="1175">Didn't know where to go. </sentence><sentence id="1176">I have a partisan of ours, he is in <span class="populated place">London</span> -- Cohen." </sentence><sentence id="1177">He was with frozen legs. </sentence><sentence id="1178">This was wintertime. </sentence><sentence id="1179">And he was sitting three days with frozen legs under the <span class="env feature">tree</span> till he saw from far away horses. </sentence><sentence id="1180">So he covered himself with the <span class="env feature">snow</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1181">He had afraid. </sentence><sentence id="1182">He heard somebody talking something Commander Bielski. </sentence><sentence id="1183">So he went out. </sentence><sentence id="1184">My husband took him on his horse, and took him to the place where he was in the <span class="building">hospital</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1185">And he is today without the fingers, but he is alive. </sentence><sentence id="1186">And he's in <span class="populated place">London</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1187">There another thing, we went to <span class="country">Israel</span> a couple years ago, a couple -- about 10, 15 years ago, and when we came, we have there two people what they were in the partisans, and they said to us like that, "You know what, one child wants to see you." </sentence><sentence id="1188">So my husband said, "How old is the child?" " </sentence><sentence id="1189">The child is about 35 years old." </sentence><sentence id="1190">He said, "Who is she?" " </sentence><sentence id="1191">You maybe don't know, but you met her under the <span class="env feature">tree</span> with her mother. </sentence><sentence id="1192">She was a baby, small baby. </sentence><sentence id="1193">And she was sitting and crying. </sentence><sentence id="1194">She didn't know what to do." </sentence><sentence id="1195">My husband said, "Don't cry. </sentence><sentence id="1196">You will be all right." </sentence><sentence id="1197">And he went and put her under the horse, the mother and child and they still -- they are alive today with families. </sentence><sentence id="1198">So you cannot deg Jack (Idel) Kagan remember everything what you did, but you did one thing, you gave them survivals. </sentence><sentence id="1199">You gave them life. </sentence><sentence id="1200">Then people were not so happy, too, in the partisan, because maybe somebody when he went to take the food, he had more food than somebody sitting the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1201">So -- but he had a piece of bread and the potato. </sentence><sentence id="1202">The other one, maybe put a piece of butter or something else in <span class="spatial object">pocket</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1203">He bring to his girlfriends, so maybe the other one was not happy. </sentence><sentence id="1204">There were command, she -- partisans, but they were the head of 10 or 20 people. </sentence><sentence id="1205">So they had better than somebody else, but that's life. </sentence><sentence id="1206">That's life. </sentence><sentence id="1207">There were many complaints, but this was nothing. </sentence><sentence id="1208">Because the life for them, they were alive. </sentence><sentence id="1209">They went to sleep, and didn't have afraid of the German for a long time. </sentence><sentence id="1210">And this is what they did, the <span class="building">Bielskis</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1211">They will go into history like not many people, because Jewish partisan, Jewish were very little. </sentence><sentence id="1212">There were Jews in other Russian partisan, but not like the Bielskis brother. </sentence><sentence id="1213">They took anybody had the place, anybody had the place. </sentence><sentence id="1214">And that's what they did. </sentence><sentence id="1215">The name -- I know my son. </sentence><sentence id="1216">I have three sons. </sentence><sentence id="1217">They are all born in <span class="country">Israel</span> were. </sentence><sentence id="1218">One is already a <span class="building">doctor</span>, 45. </sentence><sentence id="1219">I have another son, he is 40. </sentence><sentence id="1220">And my baby -- no, the other one is 42. </sentence><sentence id="1221">This one is 41. </sentence><sentence id="1222">And this one, wherever he hears something, he is staying tall. </sentence><sentence id="1223">He is six-two, too. " </sentence><sentence id="1224">That is my father." </sentence><sentence id="1225">And the fighters, the same thing, like the father. </sentence><sentence id="1226">My son the doctor, in "56 -- no, "73, he went to <span class="country">Israel</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1227">He left his studies and he were fighting there on the <span class="dlf">Jordanian border</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1228">My middle one is not so, but the baby, he finish <span class="building">college</span>, and he went and he was a parachute. </sentence><sentence id="1229">You know what is parachute?And he finished the <span class="spatial object">parachute</span>, they ask him to stay in the army. </sentence><sentence id="1230">He say, "No, I have to go <span class="building">home</span>, because I didn't say goodbye to my parents." </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1303">Q: Okay. </sentence><sentence id="1304">I will ask you something specific. </sentence><sentence id="1305">You saved a person named Daniel Ostraszynski. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1309">A: Yes, <span class="populated place">Ostraszanski</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1311">Q: Tell me about him. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1313">A: Daniel Ostraszanski was a friend of mine. </sentence><sentence id="1314">We studied together in <span class="populated place">gimnazjum</span> and <span class="populated place">liceum</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1315">And he was very intelligent guy. </sentence><sentence id="1316">I took French, he took German. </sentence><sentence id="1317">So when the German came, they ask, "Who knows German?" </sentence><sentence id="1318">So he said he. </sentence><sentence id="1319">And he was in the J udenrat"(r). </sentence><sentence id="1320">So everybody, you know, you have a family, and you are expecting if you know somebody, he should take care on yourself. </sentence><sentence id="1321">But he couldn't. </sentence><sentence id="1322">He even couldn't take care of his mother and two sisters. </sentence><sentence id="1323">He lost them, too. </sentence><sentence id="1324">After the liquidation of the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>, he came to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1325">I, with my husband, went to sleep, to a <span class="populated place">village</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1326">And in the morning about seven o'clock, we came with the horses. </sentence><sentence id="1327">My husband, he didn't go by himself, always with 10 people, riders. </sentence><sentence id="1328">deg <span class="building">Jewish council</span> (German); term used for Jewish administrative boards appointed by the Nazis to oversee <span class="populated place">Jewish communities</span> and <span class="populated place">ghettos</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1329"> We came in. </sentence><sentence id="1330">I see my friend is here. </sentence><sentence id="1331">And they took off his boots and they put him on the <span class="env feature">tree</span> for shooting. </sentence><sentence id="1332">I said, "Listen, Alex. </sentence><sentence id="1333">That's my friends." </sentence><sentence id="1334">He said, "What do you mean your friends?" </sentence><sentence id="1335">I said, "I study with him." </sentence><sentence id="1336">And I told him the story, he couldn't take care of his mother and sisters, too. </sentence><sentence id="1337">So my father -- my husband took him out from the <span class="env feature">tree</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1338">He gave it to him the boots. </sentence><sentence id="1339">And he said like that, "Whatever he did, this will be after the war. </sentence><sentence id="1340">Not now. </sentence><sentence id="1341">You cannot -- you cannot kill him now, because we will hear his story. </sentence><sentence id="1342">We heard your story, but he has something to say, too." </sentence><sentence id="1343">And this was -- they took him off of the <span class="env feature">tree</span>, and he is still alive in <span class="country">Israel</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1344">He is accountant, 20 people working for him. </sentence><sentence id="1345">Whatever he did, I don't know. </sentence><sentence id="1346">I don't know. </sentence><sentence id="1347">My brother was, too, was in August 15 died. </sentence><sentence id="1348">Maybe if I would see something, I would have said, "You could save my brothers." </sentence><sentence id="1349">But he couldn't save. </sentence><sentence id="1350">He couldn't save his own family. </sentence><sentence id="1351">How could he save somebody else? </sentence><sentence id="1352">But the people, you know, they looking for something. </sentence><sentence id="1353">You know, when you losing a child, you losing a mother, you losing a brother, you want to say, "that's his fault," but that is not true. </sentence><sentence id="1354">Not in my book. </sentence><sentence id="1355">And he is still alive. </sentence><sentence id="1356">And he is my best friends. </sentence><sentence id="1357">He was my friends, and he is my friends. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1404">Q: Did he also rescue anybody? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1406">A: <span class="populated place">Ostraszynski</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1408">Q: Yes. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1410">A: No. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1412">Q: It's just that he -- they thought he was a collaborator? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1414">A: Yes. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1416">Q: and you think he couldn't have been-- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="1418"> A; He never was. </sentence><sentence id="1419">No, no. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1422">Q: Because if he had been, he would have saved his family? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1424">A: Right. </sentence><sentence id="1425">No, he was not. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1428">Q: Okay. </sentence><sentence id="1429">Well, we're almost out, so we should break. </sentence><sentence id="1430">Okay. </sentence><sentence id="1431">We're going to change roles. </sentence><sentence id="1432">It's 10:30. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="1438"> End of Tape #1 Tape #2 </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1440">Q: I want to talk about the <span class="spatial object">food collections</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1441">Did you ever go on the <span class="spatial object">food collections</span>, or was that Just a specific -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1444">A: Never. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1446">Q: Tell me about the rules with the <span class="spatial object">food collections</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1448">A: Mostly for the food, when the boys -- you have to mention, too, because there were heroes. </sentence><sentence id="1449">Not everybody was going and eating the food, because they were collecting the food for the whole people. </sentence><sentence id="1450">And they were wonderful young people. </sentence><sentence id="1451">They gave lives away. </sentence><sentence id="1452">I have to mention their names. </sentence><sentence id="1453">You don't mind? </sentence><sentence id="1454">Okay. </sentence><sentence id="1455">One was Pesach Friedberg. </sentence><sentence id="1456">One was <span class="building">Boris Rubin</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1457">One was the ""<span class="building">Aloshki</span>," they called him. </sentence><sentence id="1458">They were from the -- our <span class="populated place">city</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1459">They were not so -- you never knew them, but they were very good boys. </sentence><sentence id="1460">They went and collect the food and they give the food to the place where everybody has to give. </sentence><sentence id="1461">Janek Rudniski. </sentence><sentence id="1462"><span class="building">Olek Peck</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1463">Alexander Peck. </sentence><sentence id="1464">They were the best guys. </sentence><sentence id="1465">The best. </sentence><sentence id="1466">They didn't have afraid for nothing. </sentence><sentence id="1467">They knew that they have to go collect the food, because if not -- if they will not collect, they will die from hunger. </sentence><sentence id="1468">That's not when you live in a small <span class="populated place">village</span> and you are not far, 500 mi-- 500 feet, and you can go in and ask for a piece of bread. </sentence><sentence id="1469">This was far away from the <span class="populated place">villages</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1470">This was in a <span class="populated place">puszcza</span>, <span class="populated place">Puszcza Naliboki</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1471">If you will go out yourself, the animals will kill you. </sentence><sentence id="1472">So they knew what they were doing, and they did a marvelous job. </sentence><sentence id="1473">They were fighting and they were taking the food and they were bringing the food. </sentence><sentence id="1474">And nobody should forget the Bielskis brother -- without the people, they will not be Bielskis partisan. </sentence><sentence id="1475">They were the heads, but they have to work with something. </sentence><sentence id="1476">And the young people made the partisans. </sentence><sentence id="1477">That is what you have to give credit. </sentence><sentence id="1478">There is no commander without the army. </sentence><sentence id="1479">And not everybody likes to mention this, but I have to mention. </sentence><sentence id="1480">Eisenhower would never win the war without the young people from the <span class="country">United States</span>, without the fighters. </sentence><sentence id="1481">They made him whatever he was. </sentence><sentence id="1482">The same thing with the <span class="building">Bielskis</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1483">The people that were surrounding them, the young boys, they were not afraid of nothing. </sentence><sentence id="1484">The commander sent them and they went. </sentence><sentence id="1485">You have never to forget this. </sentence><sentence id="1486">I think so. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1526">Q: Tell me about the <span class="spatial object">food collections</span>, did these -- they go every day? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1528">A: No. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1530">Q: Tell me how big of a job it was and how long they spent and tell me, could they just take anything they wanted? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1532">A: No. </sentence><sentence id="1533">They went out like every second week, every week. </sentence><sentence id="1534">They didn't have bread. </sentence><sentence id="1535">Later, they had bread. </sentence><sentence id="1536">They bake bread by themselves. </sentence><sentence id="1537">But in beginning, no. </sentence><sentence id="1538">They couldn't grab meat. </sentence><sentence id="1539">They couldn't grab whatever. </sentence><sentence id="1540">If the <span class="populated place">villages</span> had something too much, they took it. </sentence><sentence id="1541">But you cannot grab everything for them. </sentence><sentence id="1542">Because once you take away and the other one, they will send the German on you. </sentence><sentence id="1543">So you had to be afraid, too. </sentence><sentence id="1544">You have to let them survive, too, the war. </sentence><sentence id="1545">The war was a very bad war. </sentence><sentence id="1546">And that is what the <span class="building">Bielskis</span> did. </sentence><sentence id="1547">You cannot take away the <span class="spatial object">pillow</span>, the last one from them. </sentence><sentence id="1548">They were people, young, they didn't know. </sentence><sentence id="1549">They took the <span class="spatial object">pillow</span>, they took the <span class="spatial object">cover</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1550">What for? </sentence><sentence id="1551">But they took. </sentence><sentence id="1552">They were complaining to the Russian partisans that, "They took away my <span class="spatial object">pillow</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1553">They took away my last piece of meat." </sentence><sentence id="1554">So the Bielskis took care on that. </sentence><sentence id="1555">You couldn't take away everything. </sentence><sentence id="1556">You take only that's what you have to. </sentence><sentence id="1557">Bread we needed, that's what you have to take, nothing else. </sentence><sentence id="1558">You have to be very careful. </sentence><sentence id="1559">But they went out every two weeks, every three weeks. </sentence><sentence id="1560">Whatever they needed went out. </sentence><sentence id="1561">They were fighting the way to go out, too. </sentence><sentence id="1562">So it's not so easy. </sentence><sentence id="1563">That's what you have to remind the young guys. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1596">Q: So how big of a group? </sentence><sentence id="1597">And then, would they be gone -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1600">A: Ten. </sentence><sentence id="1601">Ten people. </sentence><sentence id="1602">Minimum 10 people. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1606">Q: Overnight? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1608">A: They went overnight. </sentence><sentence id="1609">Sometimes they were three nights away, too. </sentence><sentence id="1610">And they were thinking they will never see them, but then later they came. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1614">Q: Do you know about the time when they -- Do you know about a guy named <span class="country">Belarus</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="1616"><span class="country">Belarus</span>? </sentence><sentence id="1617">They took a coat. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1618">A: No. </sentence><sentence id="1619">I don't know that. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1622">Q: You don't know that. </sentence><sentence id="1623">Okay. </sentence><sentence id="1624">You say that you didn't sleep in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1625">You came in? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1630">A: Not always. </sentence><sentence id="1631">In the summertime, sometimes. </sentence><sentence id="1632">In the wintertime, never. </sentence><sentence id="1633">My husband didn't like it to sleep outside. </sentence><sentence id="1634">And the same thing, in the same <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1635">He was always one night a couple of hours in one <span class="building">house</span>, and then five miles away in the other <span class="building">house</span> tomorrow for another day. </sentence><sentence id="1636">He had afraid. </sentence><sentence id="1637">He was always with people, because they were looking for us. </sentence><sentence id="1638">They gave thousands of marks to -- only to find the <span class="building">Bielskis</span> -- a head. </sentence><sentence id="1639">So they have -- the people, the Polish people, they have two people what they were looking for the Bielskis to give them the head. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1650">Q: How exhausted were you from this? </sentence><sentence id="1651">How tired were you all of the time? </sentence><sentence id="1652">I mean, you must have had not gotten much sleep or-- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1656">A: You see, I cannot say that I was always tired, no. </sentence><sentence id="1657">You cannot say that, because there were weeks, two or three weeks that you didn't hear about the German. </sentence><sentence id="1658">But later when we left <span class="populated place">puszeza</span>, yes. </sentence><sentence id="1659">When I was with my husband already between the German and the Polish, there was no sleep. </sentence><sentence id="1660">You were always watching yourself every step, because you didn't know from where is it coming. </sentence><sentence id="1661">You had to go for water and you have to wash yourself. </sentence><sentence id="1662">Because all over the <span class="env feature">water</span> was divided between the <span class="populated place">villages</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1663">And there were washing the things there and drinking the water and bathing themselves. </sentence><sentence id="1664">So all over there were people and <span class="env feature">ice</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1665">And we have to watch ourselves. </sentence><sentence id="1666">The worst thing was in the winter. </sentence><sentence id="1667">The worst thing, because it was cold. </sentence><sentence id="1668">And the snow will tell you where the people are. </sentence><sentence id="1669">And to take the food was very bad, because you couldn't go off it -- you have to take the food on a <span class="spatial object">wagon</span> or something. </sentence><sentence id="1670">So you left always -- you saw every step, you were watching. </sentence><sentence id="1671">I was very lucky. </sentence><sentence id="1672">You see, I was never afraid when I was with my husband. </sentence><sentence id="1673">Never. </sentence><sentence id="1674">But as soon as I didn't see him, I was dead. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1694">Q: How -- do you know about how they got weapons in the beginning? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1696">A: Yeah. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1698">Q: Tell me about that. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1700">A: In the beginning, the Bielskis brother had -- they've lived always in a <span class="populated place">village</span>, so they were feel more secure when they had something with them. </sentence><sentence id="1701">So they had small things, small rifles. </sentence><sentence id="1702">They were went to a <span class="populated place">paysan</span>, the <span class="populated place">villages</span>, and he said, "You know, when the Russian ran away, they left a lot of rifles, in this and this <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1703">You get." </sentence><sentence id="1704">So they went to the <span class="populated place">village</span> and said, "Listen, how many you have?" </sentence><sentence id="1705">He said, "I have only one." </sentence><sentence id="1706">He said, "Give me the one." </sentence><sentence id="1707">When he went for the one, they find more than one. </sentence><sentence id="1708">So they got the rifles from the <span class="populated place">villages</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1709">Later, they made -- 10 or five German, they went for the food. </sentence><sentence id="1710">German were always looking for food, for eggs, for chickens, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="1711">So they made an ambush on them. </sentence><sentence id="1712">They saw them going and coming back. </sentence><sentence id="1713">They made an ambush of them. </sentence><sentence id="1714">They kill them. </sentence><sentence id="1715">They took the boots. </sentence><sentence id="1716">They took the foods and the rifles. </sentence><sentence id="1717">And this was the beginning. </sentence><sentence id="1718">Later, with the Russian -- in the beginning, they were fighting together with the Russian, the Bielskis. </sentence><sentence id="1719">They didn't have so many people, so they were fighting together. </sentence><sentence id="1720">And they were dividing the <span class="spatial object">rifles</span>, whatever they finded. </sentence><sentence id="1721">But the German, that they find, they had them, so they had enough. </sentence><sentence id="1722">They didn't have enough, in the beginning, people. </sentence><sentence id="1723">And they have enough rifles. </sentence><sentence id="1724">And you had people what came from the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>, they knew how to clean them, how to take care of them. </sentence><sentence id="1725">So the <span class="spatial object">rifles</span> was very good. </sentence><sentence id="1726">This is the beginning. </sentence><sentence id="1727">Later, the Russian in "43, the beginning, they were sending them us by <span class="spatial object">plane</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1728">But we were paying them. </sentence><sentence id="1729">Nobody knew about it, but I knew. </sentence><sentence id="1730">I knew it. </sentence><sentence id="1731">They preparing -- they took from everybody whatever they have, a ring, or a watch, whatever they had. </sentence><sentence id="1732">They giving away and they give to the Russian commander, to Platon, or whatever. </sentence><sentence id="1733">And they give us for that the <span class="spatial object">rifles</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1734">This was not easy, but they managed. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1770">Q: Tell me, were you involved in the move when they moved to the <span class="env feature">Naliboki forest</span> in 1943? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="1772">Were you there for the whole moving? </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1773">A: I were, but not for a long time, because the Russian commander, Platon, told my husband he is the head of the intelligence and he has to go. </sentence><sentence id="1774">So he took 150 people, but they were young, with rifles. </sentence><sentence id="1775">They were fighters. </sentence><sentence id="1776">And he took me, too. </sentence><sentence id="1777">And I went with him. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1783">Q: Tell me what you know about the move. </sentence><sentence id="1784">What-- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1787">A: The move was very bad. </sentence><sentence id="1788">I will tell you why; because nobody knew what to expect. </sentence><sentence id="1789">You know, when you are sitting in a place, you are moving from one place to another one, only a couple of -- not miles, but kilometers was there, so you know what to expect. </sentence><sentence id="1790">Yeah? </sentence><sentence id="1791">But now you have to go to a <span class="dlf">puszeza</span>, to <span class="dlf">Naliboki puszcza</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1792">From where will you take food so much?How will you survive there? </sentence><sentence id="1793">So not everybody was happy with that, but they didn't have nothing to say, because Platon said this is the only survival. " </sentence><sentence id="1794">You have to go. </sentence><sentence id="1795">I don't want him here. </sentence><sentence id="1796">I don't want him here between the German and the Polish police. </sentence><sentence id="1797">I want him there, because they are in the way for fighters." </sentence><sentence id="1798">That's what Tuvia and Asael did. </sentence><sentence id="1799">They didn't have nothing to say. </sentence><sentence id="1800">Because over them-- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1816">Q: They didn't move because they wanted to be in a-- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1818">A: No, no. </sentence><sentence id="1819">Platon told him, "The kids and the women and the old are in the way. </sentence><sentence id="1820">You cannot -- you have to take them away." </sentence><sentence id="1821">So that's why they took them to the <span class="building">Puszcza Naliboki</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1822">And the fighters stayed outside. </sentence><sentence id="1823">So from time to time, every once in two, three weeks, or four weeks, it was quiet, so my husband took the 10 or 15 horses with him and me and we went to visit my parents. </sentence><sentence id="1824">We went to visit the people, but we knew them all. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1832">Q: And it was far? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1834">A: It was far. </sentence><sentence id="1835">It was, I think. </sentence><sentence id="1836">There, 50 miles was far. </sentence><sentence id="1837">That's not when you are sitting in a <span class="spatial object">car</span> going 50 miles is nothing. </sentence><sentence id="1838">But on horses, you have to be quiet when you are going. </sentence><sentence id="1839">At night you couldn't go either, you didn't know how to go. </sentence><sentence id="1840">But in the daytime, you know. </sentence><sentence id="1841">My husband was looking on the <span class="env feature">tree</span> and he knew where he is. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1850">Q: So when you would go and visit, it was a big -- it was three days? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1852">A: Oh, sure. </sentence><sentence id="1853">We went, we stayed three days or four days, whatever. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1856">Q: Tell me about when Regina Ticktin got the flu and you -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1858">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="1859"><span class="populated place">Chrapiniewo</span> this was "43, in the beginning, I think. </sentence><sentence id="1860">Right, "43? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1864">Q: Yeah, I think so. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1865">A: They got -- came once a man and he said -- not the man, it was the <span class="populated place">villages</span>, and he said that the German preparing for <span class="populated place">Iwje</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1866">It was a <span class="populated place">city</span>, <span class="populated place">Iwje</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1867">Iwje. </sentence><sentence id="1868">Preparing action for <span class="populated place">Iwje</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1869">So they got in touch with the people there, the Bielskis, and they said, "We will come and we will take you out from the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>." </sentence><sentence id="1870">This was not too many already, you see, because there was action and action. </sentence><sentence id="1871">And over staying in <span class="populated place">Chrapiniewo</span> -- this was a <span class="populated place">village</span> before <span class="populated place">Iwie</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1872">Tt was two <span class="building">houses</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1873">One <span class="building">house</span> I was staying with Chaya, and the other <span class="building">house</span> was <span class="building">Grisha</span> " and the <span class="building">Ticktins</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1874">This was Tuvia's girlfriends, Sonia, and her sister, Regina. </sentence><sentence id="1875">She had the flu so, they were staying in another <span class="building">house</span>, not with us together. </sentence><sentence id="1876">And they let us stay in the two <span class="building">houses</span> with a couple of men with rifles, with pulemyot," you know, and it was the automatic, everything. </sentence><sentence id="1877">And they went for -- there were about 60 or 50 people to take out the people from the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>, <span class="populated place">Iwje</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1878">But when they came already, it was too late. </sentence><sentence id="1879">It's not like you are going a mile or two and that's it, but they were surrounded, the German and everything. </sentence><sentence id="1880">But the Germans were very smart. </sentence><sentence id="1881">They knew that we are in the two <span class="building">houses</span>, so they surround us, too. </sentence><sentence id="1882">I was in the first <span class="building">house</span> near the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, and Regina with Sonia, Tuvia's girlfriends, were in the other <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1883">When they surround us from in the back, we heard already they came in white. </sentence><sentence id="1884">You know, was winter. </sentence><sentence id="1885">The snow with the white things, you couldn't know that somebody is moving. </sentence><sentence id="1886">But a commander in <span class="country">Russia</span>, a Russian commander, a Russian partisan, he knew that we are staying there. </sentence><sentence id="1887">And he came and said, "Go out right away from the <span class="building">house</span>, because you will get killed. </sentence><sentence id="1888">The German are around." </sentence><sentence id="1889">I was out without boots, without a coat, without nothing. </sentence><sentence id="1890">And I said to Chaya -- Chaya was the wife of Asael -- I said, "Go. </sentence><sentence id="1891">You will tell how I died." </sentence><sentence id="1892">She said, "I am not going with you -- without you." </sentence><sentence id="1893">And she took me for the hand. </sentence><sentence id="1894">I fall in snow. </sentence><sentence id="1895">The snow was so deep. </sentence><sentence id="1896">Fall in snow "til end. </sentence><sentence id="1897">I said, "I am not going. </sentence><sentence id="1898">Okay," I said. " </sentence><sentence id="1899">So I will die together with you here. </sentence><sentence id="1900">I am not going." </sentence><sentence id="1901">She took me for the hand and led me to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1902">They were near our noses and we survived. </sentence><sentence id="1903">She gave me the hand and she said, "Sonia, you are not staying. </sentence><sentence id="1904">I cannot come to <span class="populated place">Zusia</span> and say that I let you down." </sentence><sentence id="1905">And this was all of them that dying, only me and Chaya survive, and another partisan. </sentence><sentence id="1906">What is his name? </sentence><sentence id="1907">It was ""<span class="building">Aloshka</span>," ""Aloshka." " </sentence><sentence id="1908">Aloshka" they called him. </sentence><sentence id="1909">He took us out. </sentence><sentence id="1910">We were in the <span class="env feature">forest</span> till at night. </sentence><sentence id="1911">At night, he went and took a <span class="spatial object">sled</span> and we came to the <span class="populated place">Bielskis</span>. </sentence><sentence id="1912">But they were fighting very hard the first round. </sentence><sentence id="1913">There was fighting, and they were fighting, we could survive. </sentence><sentence id="1914">We couldn't run away. </sentence><sentence id="1915">And when the Bielskis came, they didn't know that we are survived, nothing. </sentence><sentence id="1916">They saw only the two <span class="building">houses</span> in flame. </sentence><sentence id="1917">That's it. </sentence><sentence id="1918">They were thinking that everybody is gone. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1919">Q: So it was a Russian partisan that warned you and saved you in that case? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1921">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="1922">He said, ""Go out because this is the end of that," and he show us how to go out, the way, because this was the first time that we went there. </sentence><sentence id="1923">We didn't know where to go. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1927">Q: Oh, there was a secret way out? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="1929"> "" Grisha Meitis </sentence></p><p><sentence id="1930"> <span class="spatial object">B Machinegun</span> (Russian) </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1931">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="1932">Yeah, he knew. </sentence><sentence id="1933">He knew the secret, how to go out. </sentence><sentence id="1934">Because when you are surround, you have to know a place where -- how to go out. </sentence><sentence id="1935">Ifnot, you are finished. </sentence><sentence id="1936">And he told the partisan, the "Aloshka," where to take us. </sentence><sentence id="1937">And he took us like that, and we survived. </sentence><sentence id="1938">There were very beautiful people, too. </sentence><sentence id="1939">Beautiful people. </sentence><sentence id="1940">You should never forget they were beautiful Russian people and Polish people. </sentence><sentence id="1941">They were. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1953">Q: Well, you talked about the commander's nothing without his army, but did the Bielskis need to do what they did? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1955">A: No. </sentence><sentence id="1956">No. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="1959">Q: Why did they do it? </sentence><sentence id="1960">Tell me about it. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="1963">A: I think because of the good heart. </sentence><sentence id="1964">They are wonderful people with a good heart. </sentence><sentence id="1965">If he had a piece of bread, he will divide it between -- if there is four people there, or six people there, he would divide it. </sentence><sentence id="1966">He will give you the last bite. </sentence><sentence id="1967">They were wonderful, wonderful people. </sentence><sentence id="1968">I don't know how. </sentence><sentence id="1969">They are not born no more like that. </sentence><sentence id="1970">Maybe they are born, but we don't know them. </sentence><sentence id="1971">Only because of the good heart. </sentence><sentence id="1972">Because they could survive like the best people. </sentence><sentence id="1973">They could survive by the ladies. </sentence><sentence id="1974">They took care on them. </sentence><sentence id="1975">And they choose not to. </sentence><sentence id="1976">They choose to take her out some people. </sentence><sentence id="1977">And remember, 1,500 people they took her out, and 1,200 people, I think, survive. </sentence><sentence id="1978">They lost about 300 people. </sentence><sentence id="1979">But they did a very good job. </sentence><sentence id="1980">I think in the history you cannot find like that. </sentence><sentence id="1981">Maybe, but I don't know. </sentence><sentence id="1982">I know the Polish history. </sentence><sentence id="1983">I know the Jewish history. </sentence><sentence id="1984">I know the French history. </sentence><sentence id="1985">But I didn't know something like that. </sentence><sentence id="1986">People should divide their lives with people what they didn't know even. </sentence><sentence id="1987">They were great, great people. </sentence><sentence id="1988">And good people. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2015">Q: And they left a legacy? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2017">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="2018">I know one thing, that people came out without boots from the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>, without clothing, nothing. </sentence><sentence id="2019">So the first thing what they did, the commander go and bring her pair of boots, bring her something to wear it. </sentence><sentence id="2020">And they did. </sentence><sentence id="2021">They did everything they were told. </sentence><sentence id="2022">Sometimes there were people that they didn't hear, so they taught them a lesson. </sentence><sentence id="2023">Next time he didn't go. </sentence><sentence id="2024">And he was young, he wanted to go. </sentence><sentence id="2025">But they changed. </sentence><sentence id="2026">In the beginning, not. </sentence><sentence id="2027">They were robbing. </sentence><sentence id="2028">They were taking many things. </sentence><sentence id="2029">But later, they learned their lesson. </sentence><sentence id="2030">They took only what they told them. </sentence><sentence id="2031">I think the history didn't forgot them. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2047">Q: Now, there was an incident in November of "42 with a group that left to go to a <span class="dlf">puszcza</span>, the Lu--- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2049">A: <span class="populated place">Lipiczanka</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2050">Q: <span class="populated place">Lipiczanka</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2051">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="2052">In the beginning, everybody wanted to be a commander. </sentence><sentence id="2053">So in the beginning, it was -- I think it was maybe about 20 people or maybe 25, maybe 30. </sentence><sentence id="2054">I was already in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2055">And this was Motke Berger, Lubczanski brothers and another 10 people. </sentence><sentence id="2056">And they said, "Why are you a commander? </sentence><sentence id="2057">Who gave to you the right? </sentence><sentence id="2058">We don't want to go there. </sentence><sentence id="2059">We don't want to do that." </sentence><sentence id="2060">So the Bielskis brother said, "Okay. </sentence><sentence id="2061">You don't have to be. </sentence><sentence id="2062">You came here. </sentence><sentence id="2063">Now you have to go. </sentence><sentence id="2064">You leave everything what took here, the <span class="spatial object">rifles</span>, and you can go." </sentence><sentence id="2065">And they left. </sentence><sentence id="2066">After two days, they came begging. " </sentence><sentence id="2067">We don't know where to go. </sentence><sentence id="2068">We want to be with you." </sentence><sentence id="2069">And this was the end of the <span class="building">Lubczanski</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2070">They didn't go -- they didn't stay, I think, more than three days and they came back begging. </sentence><sentence id="2071">We know the people. </sentence><sentence id="2072">But everybody is entitled to a mistake. </sentence><sentence id="2073">They made a mistake. " </sentence><sentence id="2074">I don't want to go fight for them or for her or for him. </sentence><sentence id="2075">My father and mother died. </sentence><sentence id="2076">My sister died. </sentence><sentence id="2077">My wife is dead. </sentence><sentence id="2078">I don't want to go." " </sentence><sentence id="2079">You don't want it? </sentence><sentence id="2080">Go ahead." </sentence><sentence id="2081">They didn't touch them. </sentence><sentence id="2082">They only leave the <span class="spatial object">rifles</span> and go. </sentence><sentence id="2083">And they were very good partisans. </sentence><sentence id="2084">And a couple of them, they are alive now. </sentence><sentence id="2085">There were more people, other ones what -- that didn't work, not so good and not so fine. </sentence><sentence id="2086">They went to <span class="populated place">Platon</span> and they said that the Bielskis brother are communist. </sentence><sentence id="2087">And when the Bielskis brother came there to Platon, he said, "You have people what are there that are no good." </sentence><sentence id="2088">They said, "We know that." </sentence><sentence id="2089">But they didn't touch them. </sentence><sentence id="2090">A couple of times they killed them, other ones. </sentence><sentence id="2091">But this was a must already, you know, so it was too much. </sentence><sentence id="2092">But otherwise, no. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2135">Q: Tell me about order and rules within the <span class="dlf">otriad</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2136">Tell me how -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2139">A: It was order. </sentence><sentence id="2140">And they said -- they came out in the morning and they said, "Listen, today this three, this seven, these 10 people are going for food. </sentence><sentence id="2141">These are staying and watching the <span class="populated place">camp</span>." </sentence><sentence id="2142">The <span class="populated place">camp</span> was always watched by the people. </sentence><sentence id="2143">So once he said, "I cannot go. </sentence><sentence id="2144">I have a cold. </sentence><sentence id="2145">I have a bad headache. </sentence><sentence id="2146">I have something." </sentence><sentence id="2147">This was only in the beginning, but later it was <span class="populated place">Malbin</span>."? </sentence><sentence id="2148">He was an old fighter, a Polish fighter. </sentence><sentence id="2149">And he knew how to give the order. </sentence><sentence id="2150">And he helped a lot, to the <span class="populated place">Bielskis</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2151">They were another couple of people, what they were helping them, and they had the army. </sentence><sentence id="2152">They were in the Polish army. </sentence><sentence id="2153">So they knew how to give the order. </sentence><sentence id="2154">And Tuvia by himself was in the army. </sentence><sentence id="2155"><span class="populated place">Zusia</span> was in the army. </sentence><sentence id="2156">So they knew how to give the order. </sentence><sentence id="2157">And there is no such a thing, "no." </sentence><sentence id="2158">Everything is "yes, yes, and yes." </sentence><sentence id="2159">Because if everybody would do whatever he wants, it was bad. </sentence><sentence id="2160">Nobody would be alive today. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2183">Q: Well, what happened if somebody didn't do it? </sentence><sentence id="2184">I mean, tell me. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2187">A: There were a <span class="building">prison</span> in the <span class="populated place">camp</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2188">They were sitting in the <span class="building">prison</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2189">They couldn't get the food. </sentence><sentence id="2190">And this was a very big help. </sentence><sentence id="2191">But very minor incident like that. </sentence><sentence id="2192">Everybody was -- knew that 8 <span class="building">Lazar Malbin</span> you cannot get away with something like that. </sentence><sentence id="2193">You have to listen. </sentence><sentence id="2194">And they were listening. </sentence><sentence id="2195">There were people very sick with typhus. </sentence><sentence id="2196">With everything in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, in the <span class="dlf">puszcza</span>, we had doctors, we had nurses. </sentence><sentence id="2197">We have everything, but what you need is in one <span class="populated place">city</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2210">Q: Didn't some people just want to kill the first people who had typhus for fear? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2212">A: Yeah, but they didn't let them. </sentence><sentence id="2213">They wanted. </sentence><sentence id="2214">This was a couple of people that got typhus. </sentence><sentence id="2215">And the doctor said, "It's no good because everybody will get. </sentence><sentence id="2216">So maybe you should put them away." </sentence><sentence id="2217">So they said, "Oh, no. </sentence><sentence id="2218">We will take." </sentence><sentence id="2219">The <span class="building">hospital</span> was far away a little from the <span class="populated place">camp</span>, and the doctors and the nurses worked with them together, and said "They can die by themselves, but we will not kill sick people." </sentence><sentence id="2220">And then -- but there were people that said, "We have to kill them." </sentence><sentence id="2221">But nobody get killed and everybody got well because of the hearts, the <span class="interior space">Bielskis heart</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2232">Q: What about babies? </sentence><sentence id="2233">Were there any babies? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2236">A: Not too many. </sentence><sentence id="2237">Not too many. </sentence><sentence id="2238">Were a couple of babies. </sentence><sentence id="2239">They came with babies. </sentence><sentence id="2240">Because if you were pregnant, we had a doctor what he did what he had to do. </sentence><sentence id="2241">And there were six or 10 babies that came with the parents, but that's all. </sentence><sentence id="2242">We didn't let her go pregnant. </sentence><sentence id="2243">This was not the place for pregnancy. </sentence><sentence id="2244">And they said, "You have to be very careful." </sentence><sentence id="2245">Because if you were a girl, young, 16 or 17 years old, if you were by yourself, you couldn't get everything. </sentence><sentence id="2246">You wouldn't -- you didn't have shoes. </sentence><sentence id="2247">You didn't have nothing. </sentence><sentence id="2248">So everybody was looking for somebody, a partisan, who should take care on her. </sentence><sentence id="2249">So that's what happened. </sentence><sentence id="2250">And many people are still alive together. </sentence><sentence id="2251">They got together in the <span class="env feature">forest</span> and they went out from the <span class="env feature">forest</span> with them. </sentence><sentence id="2252">And they have children and families and everything. </sentence><sentence id="2253">And other ones went away. </sentence><sentence id="2254">They were looking for something better. </sentence><sentence id="2255">I don't know if they made it better or worse. </sentence><sentence id="2256">This is after then. </sentence><sentence id="2257">But this was mostly all the girls, whatever they had, they were with a partisan, with somebody should keep them company and to watch on them. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2280">Q: Protect them? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2282">A: Protect them. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2284">Q: From -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2286">A: Protect them from everything, from cold. </sentence><sentence id="2287">Nobody went to a girl and said, "You have to sleep with me." </sentence><sentence id="2288">No. </sentence><sentence id="2289">If she slept with him, she wanted. </sentence><sentence id="2290">He couldn't do something to her what she didn't want it. </sentence><sentence id="2291">No. </sentence><sentence id="2292">Nobody tortured. </sentence><sentence id="2293">It's not like today, you going out, you don't know if you will coming <span class="building">home</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2294">There you knew that if you don't want it, nobody will touch you. </sentence><sentence id="2295">It was an order, and they were listening very careful to everything. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2296">Q: The big hunt, do you know about the big hunt? </sentence><sentence id="2297">Were you -- </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2298">A: This was in "43. </sentence><sentence id="2299">Right? </sentence><sentence id="2300">We were surrounded with the army, the German army. </sentence><sentence id="2301">And we went till here in <span class="env feature">water</span> [interviewee gestures]. </sentence><sentence id="2302">And in -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2308">Q: <span class="env feature">Mud</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2310">A: <span class="env feature">Mud</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2311">And it was hunger. </sentence><sentence id="2312">We were sitting there 10 days, and we heard the German talking to each other. </sentence><sentence id="2313">We heard the dogs barking. </sentence><sentence id="2314">And they were shooting over our head and nobody opened their mouth. </sentence><sentence id="2315">Somebody opened, "I am dying." </sentence><sentence id="2316">So my husband came, "You are not dying yet, but you will die now. </sentence><sentence id="2317">I will kill you." </sentence><sentence id="2318">And this is the big hunt was. </sentence><sentence id="2319">They didn't kill too many from us, because we were sitting in the <span class="env feature">mud</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2320">And my husband opened -- I told you that he open the <span class="dlf">road</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2321">He went out the first because he couldn't take the hunger. </sentence><sentence id="2322">I went with him. </sentence><sentence id="2323">I think 100 people were. </sentence><sentence id="2324">I mentioned that when we went -- when the German only left five minutes ago, the fires still was burning. </sentence><sentence id="2325">They saw the cans of the food, they didn't touch it. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2342">Q: Tell me -- go back to the beginning and explain to me what happened. </sentence><sentence id="2343">The Germans came close and surrounded the whole, the whole -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2346">A: Right, the whole. </sentence><sentence id="2347">The German couldn't go -- 10 there Germans, or 20. </sentence><sentence id="2348">It was a big place. </sentence><sentence id="2349">They took it the whole army, the German army. </sentence><sentence id="2350">They surrounded the whole <span class="dlf">puszcza</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2351">In the beginning, in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, too. </sentence><sentence id="2352">If they were surrounded in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, we were sitting, they would kill us all. </sentence><sentence id="2353">But they didn't surround it. </sentence><sentence id="2354">There were not so many Germans. </sentence><sentence id="2355">They were busy on the fronts. </sentence><sentence id="2356">Later, when they run away from the fronts, when they went away already, they took of whole army of German and they wanted to kill all of the people that were in the puszeza, in the Naliboki. </sentence><sentence id="2357">But it was very difficult, to do it, too. </sentence><sentence id="2358">Because they didn't want to lose their lives, too. </sentence><sentence id="2359">They couldn't come with <span class="spatial object">tanks</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2360">That's a <span class="env feature">forest</span>, a wild <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2361">So who wants to risk their life when they see everything that's going kaput? </sentence><sentence id="2362">They were seeing everything is going kaput. </sentence><sentence id="2363">You know what that's meaning? </sentence><sentence id="2364">Everything is gone to the end. </sentence><sentence id="2365">Hitler is gone. </sentence><sentence id="2366">Everything is going down. </sentence><sentence id="2367">So he was looking by himself to survive. </sentence><sentence id="2368">So he didn't go to <span class="env feature">forests</span>, because if he would go "til the <span class="env feature">mud</span>, he will kill us all. </sentence><sentence id="2369">He didn't go. </sentence><sentence id="2370">He knew that's will be the end of his life, too. </sentence><sentence id="2371">That was the big hunt. </sentence><sentence id="2372">Many people die. </sentence><sentence id="2373">Many partisan died, but from the <span class="populated place">Bielskis</span>, nobody had brains to sit in the <span class="env feature">mud</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2374">And they said, "that's the only survive, to sit in the <span class="env feature">mud</span>, because they will not come here." </sentence><sentence id="2375">And that's how we survive. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2406">Q: Who decided to go to the <span class="env feature">swamp</span> and sit in the <span class="env feature">mud</span>? </sentence><sentence id="2407">How did--? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2410">A: The <span class="building">Bielskis brothers</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2411">Q: And how did that happen? </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2412">A: Happen we had one man, what -- I don't remember his name, and he was working always there, in the <span class="building">puszeza</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2413">And he was from <span class="populated place">Naliboki</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2414">And he said that he remember that not far from the beginning of the <span class="dlf">puszcza</span> there is <span class="env feature">mud</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2415">Nobody can go into the <span class="env feature">mud</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2416">So the Bielskis brothers were talking to each other and they decided that we have to try this way, because we couldn't go out from there. </sentence><sentence id="2417">We were surrounded with the army and this was their decision. </sentence><sentence id="2418">We went to the <span class="env feature">mud</span> and was sitting in the <span class="env feature">mud</span>, I think, about 7, 10 days. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2426">Q: Tell me the details of that. </sentence><sentence id="2427">How did families stay together in the <span class="env feature">mud</span> and everything? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2430">A: They were staying and sleeping in the <span class="env feature">mud</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2431">And they are not talking because nothing was to talk about it. </sentence><sentence id="2432">You couldn't talk, because we heard the German talking. </sentence><sentence id="2433">And they didn't have nothing. </sentence><sentence id="2434">You know, everybody has a piece of bread. </sentence><sentence id="2435">That they knew there would come a moment that they will not have nothing. </sentence><sentence id="2436">So they had a package -- a small package of bread, so they were mumbling about the bread till the bread ends. </sentence><sentence id="2437">How long can you hold a piece of bread? </sentence><sentence id="2438">They kill one horse. </sentence><sentence id="2439">In a minute, the meat went away. </sentence><sentence id="2440">They were eating the horse, dead. </sentence><sentence id="2441">And this is it -- listen, there is no -- people get used to everything. </sentence><sentence id="2442">How could you eat a piece of meat raw, meat from a horse, from a dead horse? </sentence><sentence id="2443">But they were eating. </sentence><sentence id="2444">We see now, too, in the <span class="country">United States</span>, some days friends went out and a <span class="spatial object">plane</span> fall. </sentence><sentence id="2445">I don't remember when was it. </sentence><sentence id="2446">And the friends eat the meat of the other friends. </sentence><sentence id="2447">I don't remember, but it was like -- something like that. </sentence><sentence id="2448">So this is it. </sentence><sentence id="2449">You are trying. </sentence><sentence id="2450">The survival is so big that you want to do everything to survive. </sentence><sentence id="2451">Same thing was in the partisan. </sentence><sentence id="2452">You were thinking that you will survive. </sentence><sentence id="2453">You will see a <span class="env feature">world</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2454">You will see somebody. </sentence><sentence id="2455">Maybe somebody is still alive. </sentence><sentence id="2456">So they were hoping, always hope that something will happen good with you. </sentence><sentence id="2457">And that's was holding us all together. </sentence><sentence id="2458">When we were sitting at night and they were singing -- far in the <span class="dlf">puszcza</span>, nobody was there, only us -- so we were singing and -- you know -- and talking, so they said, "You know what?" </sentence><sentence id="2459">this is already a couple of years like that -- "I am sure that this will be a break. </sentence><sentence id="2460">Roosevelt will send somebody here and we will survive." </sentence><sentence id="2461">Only hope. </sentence><sentence id="2462">Nobody was thinking that, "I will die." </sentence><sentence id="2463">When I was asking my husband some place, "Tell me, will we survive?" </sentence><sentence id="2464">He said to me like that, "I don't know about me, but you will survive." </sentence><sentence id="2465">And I was quiet then. </sentence><sentence id="2466">I was so sure that whatever he said to me this will be. </sentence><sentence id="2467">This is the hope. </sentence><sentence id="2468">He gave it to me, the hope. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2508">Q: Did anybody drown in the <span class="env feature">swamp</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2510">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="2511">Yes, but this was nothing. </sentence><sentence id="2512">Nothing. </sentence><sentence id="2513">The sick, the old one couldn't take it, the hunger. </sentence></p><p><sentence id="2514">But it was not too many, probably about five or six, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="2515">We didn't talk about it. </sentence><sentence id="2516">This was the day and this is it. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2517">Q: And then when you went back to the <span class="dlf">puszcza</span>, but it was gone, the Germans destroyed it? </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2518">A: No. </sentence><sentence id="2519">You cannot destroy the <span class="dlf">puszcza</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2520">The <span class="building">puszeza</span> stayed. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2524">Q: No. </sentence><sentence id="2525">No, but the <span class="building">ziemlankas</span>, the <span class="populated place">villages</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2528">A: The <span class="populated place">villages</span> around? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2530">Q: No, the thing you had created, the <span class="populated place">partisan village</span>? </sentence><sentence id="2531">Your--? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2534">A: No. </sentence><sentence id="2535">It stayed, because in the last days when the German was running so we went out from the <span class="building">ziemlankas</span> because they had afraid. </sentence><sentence id="2536">The Germans came on the <span class="building">ziemlankas</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2537">They were keeping themselves there -- they were keeping, so -- and we left. </sentence><sentence id="2538">We left everything. </sentence><sentence id="2539">Many were killed by us, but they killed, too, a couple of us. </sentence><sentence id="2540">We left everything. </sentence><sentence id="2541">I know last year -- two years ago a group went to see them. </sentence><sentence id="2542">There is some <span class="building">ziemlankas</span> still staying. </sentence><sentence id="2543">Yeah. </sentence><sentence id="2544">They were built beautiful. </sentence><sentence id="2545">In the winter was not cold. </sentence><sentence id="2546">They live like that. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2560">Q: In the winter, how did you heat them, the fire in the middle of them? </sentence><sentence id="2561">Tell me about--? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2564">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="2565">In the <span class="building">ziemlankas</span>, was a small <span class="spatial object">fireplace</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2566">Like here, you have a <span class="spatial object">fireplace</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2567">And this was warm. </sentence><sentence id="2568">They were cooking, because everybody was cooking for themselves later. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2574">Q: With a <span class="dlf">hole</span> in the <span class="dlf">roof</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2576">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="2577">Yes. </sentence><sentence id="2578">Mostly they were cooking at night, not in the daytime. </sentence><sentence id="2579">They should not see the fume from there. </sentence><sentence id="2580">They knew how to behave. </sentence><sentence id="2581">They knew. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2588">Q: Tell me about the <span class="dlf">tunnel</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2590">A: The <span class="dlf">tunnel</span> was built in the <span class="building">court</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2592">Q: Tell me when we are. </sentence><sentence id="2593">This is near the end, right? </sentence><sentence id="2594">This is when there weren't many Jews left? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2598">A: No many, not many. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2600">Q: Describe to me the situation. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="2602"> A The situation -- I was not there, but I will tell you. </sentence><sentence id="2603">Ostraszynski, Daniel, and my best friends Bursztyn,"* they were planning this and they did it. </sentence><sentence id="2604">Nobody knew about it. </sentence><sentence id="2605">But the ones they 4 Moshe Burnstein called the <span class="building">Bursztyn</span> -- I don't know how else -- this my friends. </sentence><sentence id="2606">And they took him to the <span class="building">prison</span> and he wrote with his fingers with blood that they asking him, but he told them he didn't know nothing. </sentence><sentence id="2607">They killed him. </sentence><sentence id="2608">But Ostraszynski went out, too, from the <span class="dlf">tunnel</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2609">And many friends of mine Oshmans, Sonia, Aaron, another couple, they went out from the <span class="dlf">tunnel</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2610">Not everybody, because the first group went out, but the second group got killed. </sentence><sentence id="2611">They caught them going out from the <span class="dlf">tunnel</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2612">But a couple, when they went out, they saying and they telling us how was it. </sentence><sentence id="2613">They were working at night. </sentence><sentence id="2614">Nobody knew about it till somebody told them that -- they heard something is going on so quiet. </sentence><sentence id="2615">So this is the story from the <span class="dlf">tunnel</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2616">They survive. </sentence><sentence id="2617">This was -- you know, when I am looking now, when I am thinking about it, you see the Japanese who are in the <span class="populated place">prisons camps</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2618">People what they were in the <span class="building">army</span> that dig <span class="dlf">tunnels</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2619">Not everybody survive from there, but they did. </sentence><sentence id="2620">And this is only young people, young Jews that they never were in the <span class="building">army</span>, in the Polish. </sentence><sentence id="2621">And they made such a plan. </sentence><sentence id="2622">This was something very smart. </sentence><sentence id="2623">Not too many survive. </sentence><sentence id="2624">They were beautiful friends of mine. </sentence><sentence id="2625">Girls. </sentence><sentence id="2626">Beautiful. </sentence><sentence id="2627">So they caught them, and they did whatever they did, and they killed them. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2655">Q: So the <span class="dlf">tunnel</span>, do you know how long it was in the <span class="building">building</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2657">A: I don't know, but it was not too long because it was under the <span class="building">building</span>, and right away was the surrounding. </sentence><sentence id="2658">They went out to <span class="env feature">forest</span>, not far. </sentence><sentence id="2659">So who was running fast or knew how to run, ran out. </sentence><sentence id="2660">Now, they were looking where to go, they didn't know where to go, so they caught them. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2665">Q: And some stayed inside and got caught inside? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2667">A: They caught, yes. </sentence><sentence id="2668">Everybody was killed. </sentence><sentence id="2669">I think about 20 people, whatever 25 went out. </sentence><sentence id="2670">They had the plans. </sentence><sentence id="2671">They have in <span class="country">Israel</span> the plans. </sentence><sentence id="2672">I think here in the <span class="building">Holocaust Museum</span> is too, they have too the plan, how did they go out, and how was they planned it -- the <span class="dlf">tunnel</span> made. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2679">Q: When the group left to go to the other <span class="env feature">forest</span>, the <span class="env feature">Lubezanka</span>, didn't they have a group of people with them who didn't come back, who died? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2681">A: Die, on <span class="dlf">road</span>, yeah. </sentence><sentence id="2682">This was not too many. </sentence><sentence id="2683">Not too many. </sentence><sentence id="2684">No. </sentence><sentence id="2685">Not too many, 10, about 15 people. </sentence><sentence id="2686">Not too many. </sentence><sentence id="2687">They didn't want to be with the <span class="building">Bielskis</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2688">They were looking for something else. </sentence><sentence id="2689">You think always the <span class="env feature">grass</span> is greener on the other side. </sentence><sentence id="2690">But they got killed. </sentence><sentence id="2691">Who wanted that Jew, that old Jew? </sentence><sentence id="2692">Who want it, between me and you? </sentence><sentence id="2693">When you are young, something else, you may be a fighter or whatever. </sentence><sentence id="2694">But they didn't go. </sentence><sentence id="2695">The fighters didn't go for a couple of them. </sentence><sentence id="2696">But they got killed on the <span class="dlf">road</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2697">The only survivors mostly were by the <span class="building">Bielskis</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2715">Q: The partisans who fought with the Bielskis? </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2716">A: The partisans. </sentence><sentence id="2717">We had many partisan Russians near us. </sentence><sentence id="2718"><span class="populated place">Iskra</span> was very good. </sentence><sentence id="2719">There were other small Jewish otriad, but they didn't survive. </sentence><sentence id="2720">And the Jew were what they were, but the Iskra were the best fighters, the best. </sentence><sentence id="2721">They went all over. </sentence><sentence id="2722">They were fighting, but nobody even mentioned them because this was a Russian partisan. </sentence><sentence id="2723">Iskra. </sentence><sentence id="2724">They were the best fighters for the Jewish people there. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2725">Q: You talked a little bit about good people. </sentence><sentence id="2726">There are good people and bad people in all groups. </sentence><sentence id="2727">By and large in the <span class="populated place">forest community</span>, were people pretty generous and pretty selfless? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2731">A: Not too many. </sentence><sentence id="2732">Not too many. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2735">Q: Tell me. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2737">A: Not too many. </sentence><sentence id="2738">Mostly they were very good people. </sentence><sentence id="2739">You know, they were always giving a hand to the other ones. </sentence><sentence id="2740">If had another pair of shoes, I would give to the other one, the ones that didn't have. </sentence><sentence id="2741">They were not grabbing everything for them. </sentence><sentence id="2742">No, there were not too many like that. </sentence><sentence id="2743">If you had a couple of people, so they were not with the groups, they were lonely. </sentence><sentence id="2744">And if you were good with all of them, you work together, you were not so lonely. </sentence><sentence id="2745">You spoke about your families. </sentence><sentence id="2746">You spoke about your future, what it will be. </sentence><sentence id="2747">You were singing. </sentence><sentence id="2748">They were dancing. </sentence><sentence id="2749">They were waiting for a <span class="spatial object">plane</span> from <span class="populated place">Moscow</span>, like -- I don't know -- like angels were coming. </sentence><sentence id="2750">And they knew everything. </sentence><sentence id="2751">I know when my parents were alive with me in the partisan, came a <span class="spatial object">plane</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2752">And I had a cousin, a doctor in <span class="populated place">Moscow</span>, my mother's cousin. </sentence><sentence id="2753">So my mother wrote a letter. </sentence><sentence id="2754">She knew the family. </sentence><sentence id="2755">She knew that they were doctors. </sentence><sentence id="2756">And she sent a letter to them and, "Please, if you're alive, I have two sons in <span class="country">Israel</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2757">Tell them that we are alive, and I hope to be alive still." </sentence><sentence id="2758">And you know what, when we came to <span class="country">Israel</span> - - we were the first in "45, in October "45, we were already in <span class="country">Israel</span> because Sharett -- this was a minister, an Israeli -- Israeli was not then in existence. </sentence><sentence id="2759">It was <span class="country">Palestine</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2760"><span class="country">Israel</span> came alive in "48. </sentence><sentence id="2761">So he heard about the <span class="building">Bielskis</span> when he was sitting in <span class="country">Israel</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2762">You know, people from <span class="country">Europe</span>, they were talking about the <span class="populated place">Bielskis</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2763">And he said when we came he send us the first papers to <span class="country">Romania</span>, with legal right to go by <span class="spatial object">plane</span> -- by <span class="spatial object">boat</span> to <span class="country">Israel</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2764">When we came into <span class="country">Israel</span> in 45, my brother said, "I knew about you. </sentence><sentence id="2765">I got a letter from <span class="populated place">Moscow</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2766">And I knew that you are alive, that my brother, J ay," is not alive. </sentence><sentence id="2767">But I knew about you and the parents." </sentence><sentence id="2768">So you see, everything you cannot -- everything you knew about. </sentence><sentence id="2769">Everything. </sentence><sentence id="2770">You knew in <span class="country">Israel</span> about the fighters. </sentence><sentence id="2771">You knew about the Jewish partisan. </sentence><sentence id="2772">You knew about the people, the leader -- the fighters -- the Israeli came to Europe to fight the German. </sentence><sentence id="2773">They each know about the other one. </sentence><sentence id="2774">And when we came to <span class="country">Israel</span>, they took us on beautiful -- they gave us right away a <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2775">They gave us everything what they could, what they had. </sentence><sentence id="2776">And "S Jacob Boldo we made a living. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2818">Q: What did -- did you know anything else that was going on in other <span class="region">parts of Europe</span> then? </sentence><sentence id="2819">Did you know about <span class="populated place">concentration camps</span> and <span class="populated place">death camps</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2822">A: Sure, we know. </sentence><sentence id="2823">We know about the concentration, because the people were telling us about <span class="populated place">Majdanek</span>, <span class="populated place">Treblinka</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2824">The Polish people, they were saying to each other what happened there. </sentence><sentence id="2825">We knew everything. </sentence><sentence id="2826">We knew even -- we didn't know how many, we didn't know -- but we know about the <span class="populated place">concentration camps</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2827">We knew everything. </sentence><sentence id="2828">There was no secrets. </sentence><sentence id="2829">You know, we didn't have so many <span class="spatial object">telephones</span>, but the people are telephones, <span class="spatial object">living telephones</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2830">One was saying to the other one, and the other one was telling the other one, and that's what we knew about everything. </sentence><sentence id="2831">But we couldn't help nothing. </sentence><sentence id="2832">The helping hands was that the <span class="building">Bielskis</span> gave so many people life in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2833">They were keeping them and feeding them. </sentence><sentence id="2834">And you know that from the people when they came to the <span class="env feature">forest</span> from <span class="populated place">Lida</span>, they were people came were 15 years, 16 years, 17 years, young boys. </sentence><sentence id="2835">And then now, they went out in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, they came to the <span class="country">United States</span>, to <span class="country">Canada</span>, they billionaires. </sentence><sentence id="2836">And they were helping other ones here, too. </sentence><sentence id="2837">Because they learn a lesson, that you have to help somebody if you need. </sentence><sentence id="2838">And they give many, many, many thing to help people to stand on their feet. </sentence><sentence id="2839">All over the world you have <span class="building">partisan house</span>, in <span class="country">Australia</span>, in <span class="country">Canada</span>, in <span class="populated place">Johannesburg</span>, in <span class="country">Africa</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2840">Many, many. </sentence><sentence id="2841">When we have -- they are coming some place every five years, every six years, they coming <span class="country">Israel</span> for a reunion from all over the whole world. </sentence><sentence id="2842">And they asking, "You need something?" </sentence><sentence id="2843">This is something what you put it in when they were young when you will not put it in, you will not have it. </sentence><sentence id="2844">The same thing like parents. </sentence><sentence id="2845">You have children, you teach them what is good and what is bad, and even if they are not doing this right away, they will do it later, because they remember what mother and father taught them, how you have to behave. </sentence><sentence id="2846">And if you are not teaching this to the children, they will not do it. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2872">Q: Tell me about an average day in the <span class="env feature">forest</span> for women and children. </sentence><sentence id="2873">What would they be doing all day? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2876">A: The day begin at six o'clock in the morning. </sentence><sentence id="2877">They were cooking, and feeding the children, and feeding the old. </sentence><sentence id="2878">Everybody did something. </sentence><sentence id="2879">They went after the <span class="env feature">forest</span> to take off to take the -- to put the fire. </sentence><sentence id="2880">They were preparing for the <span class="interior space">kitchen</span>, the potatoes, the soup. </sentence><sentence id="2881">They were baking the <span class="spatial object">bread</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2882">So it was a long day, a very long day. </sentence><sentence id="2883">But everybody did what he had to do. </sentence><sentence id="2884">Not everybody ate the same thing, no. </sentence><sentence id="2885">The commander, they eat something else, but nobody was hungry. </sentence><sentence id="2886">That is the main thing. </sentence><sentence id="2887">They complaining. </sentence><sentence id="2888">They were complaining. </sentence><sentence id="2889">Not everybody -- the children had milk, the old one they had milk. </sentence><sentence id="2890">And this ones that came from the <span class="building">houses</span> they said, "Where is the milk I brought in? </sentence><sentence id="2891">I want a little milk." " </sentence><sentence id="2892">You cannot have it. </sentence><sentence id="2893">That's for the children, for the old, for the sick." </sentence><sentence id="2894">And they didn't touch it. </sentence><sentence id="2895">Women were working, too. </sentence><sentence id="2896">Sometimes, not too many went with the men, but not always. </sentence><sentence id="2897">Not always. </sentence><sentence id="2898"> Mostly they were working on the -- in the <span class="dlf">puszcza</span> near the <span class="interior space">kitchen</span>, near the children, near the <span class="building">hospital</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2899">They were sewing. </sentence><sentence id="2900">A regular work day, six o'clock in the morning. </sentence><sentence id="2901">The men would tell them at night they went for three, four days. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2928">Q: And repairing guns and--? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2930">A: Everything was in the <span class="dlf">puszcza</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2931">We had people, they were working. </sentence><sentence id="2932">They knew how to repair, and the other ones, they teach to each other. </sentence><sentence id="2933">And they knew everything was working in very good shape. </sentence><sentence id="2934">You had to have -- to prepare the everything. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2940">Q: In the <span class="dlf">puszeza</span>, in the <span class="populated place">community</span>, were people unafraid or were they afraid most of the time? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2942">A: No, they were not afraid. </sentence><sentence id="2943">They were very happy to be there. </sentence><sentence id="2944">In the beginning, they didn't know what is it -- how will be. </sentence><sentence id="2945">But later, the German were far away. </sentence><sentence id="2946">They heard only when they came -- the boys came with the food that they say this <span class="populated place">village</span> was attacked by the German. </sentence><sentence id="2947">This and that. </sentence><sentence id="2948">But they lived a very quiet life. </sentence><sentence id="2949">They were working and did what they's told. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2958">Q: What about recreation? </sentence><sentence id="2959">I mean, what about having fun? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2962">A: The fun was, they were sitting together near the fire and singing and talking. </sentence><sentence id="2963">That was the fun. </sentence><sentence id="2964">Whatever they did in the <span class="building">ziemlankas</span> we don't know. </sentence><sentence id="2965">Probably, you know, the young people. </sentence><sentence id="2966">But that was the fun, what we knew about it. </sentence><sentence id="2967">Everybody was getting near the fire. </sentence><sentence id="2968">Everybody was looking for somebody, for a little warm talking, remember the <span class="building">house</span>, remember the parents. </sentence><sentence id="2969">It was -- most were from the <span class="populated place">city</span> of <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span>, <span class="populated place">Lida</span>, <span class="populated place">Baranovichi</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2970">This was not far away from each other. </sentence><sentence id="2971">In the summertime, in the good times, they were meeting each other in <span class="populated place">Novoyelnya</span>, this was like here you coming to <span class="region">Florida</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2972">So they knew mostly each other. </sentence><sentence id="2973">If didn't know personal, so they heard about them. </sentence><sentence id="2974">And this was nice to talk, to remember. </sentence><sentence id="2975">Not to forget. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="2990">Q: Did they -- did people get to go back to their <span class="building">homes</span> after the war ended? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="2992">A: Yeah, they came to the <span class="building">houses</span>. </sentence><sentence id="2993">The <span class="building">houses</span> were already occupied by the Polish people. </sentence><sentence id="2994">And nobody wanted to stay in the family, to remember. </sentence><sentence id="2995">Everybody was killed there. </sentence><sentence id="2996">So this was not in their interest. </sentence><sentence id="2997">If you were from <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span>, they went out to <span class="populated place">Lida</span> where they didn't know them. </sentence><sentence id="2998">They didn't want to stay in the <span class="building">houses</span> no more. </sentence><sentence id="2999">They were empty. </sentence><sentence id="3000">When you came to the <span class="building">house</span> where you lived, what will you see there? </sentence><sentence id="3001">Nothing. </sentence><sentence id="3002">So they run away from there. </sentence><sentence id="3003">And everybody took the easy way, to go away to another <span class="populated place">city</span>, to stay with other people. </sentence><sentence id="3004">This is it. </sentence><sentence id="3005">But nobody stay in the same <span class="populated place">city</span>, in the same <span class="building">houses</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3006">I don't think so. </sentence><sentence id="3007">I know now people went to <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span> about two years ago. </sentence><sentence id="3008">There is only one from the partisan. </sentence><sentence id="3009">He marry a Polish girl and has his children and he stays. </sentence><sentence id="3010">No more else. </sentence><sentence id="3011">There were marriages, many, after the war where they marry -- where a Jew marry a Polish, a Polish girl marry a Jew. </sentence><sentence id="3012">You know, like all over the world. </sentence><sentence id="3013">But they were not staying in the <span class="populated place">cities</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3014">They went away -- they went away to Europe, they went away to <span class="country">Israel</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3015">Not too many. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3040">Q: I think we're about to run out; am I right? </sentence><sentence id="3041">Why don't we stop now. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="3044"> End of Tape #2 Tape #3 </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3046">Q: Now, Sonia, we're going to talk a little bit about various things. </sentence><sentence id="3047">And so first, why don't you tell me a little bit about the Bielski parents, the parents of the three brothers, or really it was many more. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3050">A: I really didn't know them, but I know them from my husband what he is repeating, what he is telling us. </sentence><sentence id="3051">They were very honest, poor family. </sentence><sentence id="3052">He fell in love with a girl which she didn't have money. </sentence><sentence id="3053">Once upon a time, you couldn't marry if you didn't have money. </sentence><sentence id="3054">But the husband, David, the father, he fell in love. </sentence><sentence id="3055">She was a beautiful, a tall girl, a blonde. </sentence><sentence id="3056">All of them looks like their mother. </sentence><sentence id="3057">And she was working with him, hand-in-hand. </sentence><sentence id="3058">And they had a woman -- they had 12 children, and all of them a year, two, three, four, five, six, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="3059">So they had -- they were working in a place where they making for the corn, flour. </sentence><sentence id="3060">What is it called? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3072">Q: <span class="building">Amill</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3073">A <span class="building">flour mill</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3076">A: Yes, very small, on the <span class="env feature">water</span>, and everybody was working there till they grow up a little. </sentence><sentence id="3077">When they grow up, the first one, the father of this girl, Walter"(r) was the oldest. </sentence><sentence id="3078">He went to <span class="building">school</span> in the <span class="populated place">city</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3079">Then, <span class="building">Tuvia</span>, the second one, was too, in the <span class="populated place">city</span> for a couple of years. </sentence><sentence id="3080">And another sister was too in the <span class="populated place">city</span>, were going to <span class="building">school</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3081">The other ones were small children and they were in the <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3082">They had always a teacher for them at <span class="building">home</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3083">They couldn't afford to send them out. </sentence><sentence id="3084">And mother was working, and father was working, and the brothers were working. </sentence><sentence id="3085">And they made a living. </sentence><sentence id="3086">They put -- made the flours and <span class="building">market</span> it with another boy, with the son, took the flour to <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3087">And they were selling the flours. </sentence><sentence id="3088">This is the living. </sentence><sentence id="3089">They had a <span class="dlf">garden</span> near the <span class="building">house</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3090">They had water enough, so they have a <span class="interior space">garden</span> and all the vegetables they had. </sentence><sentence id="3091">I don't think they had fruits, but vegetables. </sentence><sentence id="3092">And they had a little fish in the <span class="env feature">water</span>, and a chicken and eggs -- plain, but healthy living. </sentence><sentence id="3093">You see, when you are living like that, if you can -- if 10 brothers can grow up, six-two, so probably food was good. </sentence><sentence id="3094">They had always a woman from the <span class="populated place">village</span> which she was helping her -- the mother. </sentence><sentence id="3095">And there was a lot of love between them. </sentence><sentence id="3096">Father was crazy about the mother. </sentence><sentence id="3097">And he should be, because she was working very hard, more than him. </sentence><sentence id="3098">This I know. </sentence><sentence id="3099">I never saw them. </sentence><sentence id="3100">I once asked my mother, "Mommy, do you remember this lady from the <span class="populated place">village</span>?" </sentence><sentence id="3101">She said, "I never knew them, but I know they were a very honest family." </sentence><sentence id="3102">And everybody who came to the <span class="building">mill</span> to ask for something, they were helping them. </sentence><sentence id="3103">Because in the <span class="populated place">village</span> there were only five <span class="building">houses</span>, four from the <span class="populated place">villages</span> and one <span class="building">house</span> was their's. </sentence><sentence id="3104">So they were very poor, "(r) Velvel Bielski the people from the <span class="populated place">village</span>, the <span class="populated place">village</span> -- five <span class="building">houses</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3105">So they were always coming to ask for a little flour, for a couple of pennies to lend them. </sentence><sentence id="3106">He was -- always had a open <span class="building">house</span> for them. </sentence><sentence id="3107">Maybe they stood. </sentence><sentence id="3108">They were a member. </sentence><sentence id="3109">But there were many from other <span class="populated place">villages</span> that were a little farther. </sentence><sentence id="3110">They came first to tell them that the brothers beat up somebody when the <span class="populated place">German camp</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3111">Came to beat up them and they tell them that the brothers are Communist. </sentence><sentence id="3112">And they were not Communist, but they wanted, you know, to take away the <span class="building">mill</span> with everything, and they brought in the German. </sentence><sentence id="3113">And they took them away, the mother and father and two brothers. </sentence><sentence id="3114">But they're not alive no more. </sentence><sentence id="3115">When they went already to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, they took -- they invited them and killed them all with their children with everybody. </sentence><sentence id="3116">They were -- everybody had afraid of them. </sentence><sentence id="3117">They knew what they did. </sentence><sentence id="3118">You understand? </sentence><sentence id="3119">I was very sick in the partisan. </sentence><sentence id="3120">I was so sick. </sentence><sentence id="3121">I was not prepared for the winter. </sentence><sentence id="3122">I was not prepared for the living. </sentence><sentence id="3123">And I had blood in my <span class="spatial object">bladder</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3124">And the doctor said that I have to have a warm <span class="spatial object">bed</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3125">I have to have a couple of times, because I was so sick, I couldn't walk, I couldn't talk, nothing. </sentence><sentence id="3126">So there was not far a big <span class="building">mill</span> from flours with a family. </sentence><sentence id="3127">And there they had a beautiful daughter and to the daughter they came, the Germans. </sentence><sentence id="3128">And Zus took me there to the <span class="building">mill</span> and said to her, "This is my wife. </sentence><sentence id="3129">You have to take care of her. </sentence><sentence id="3130">She is very sick." </sentence><sentence id="3131">And they took care of me. </sentence><sentence id="3132">They put me in a place that nobody saw me. </sentence><sentence id="3133">And she brought me - - she cooked for me, she gave me <span class="spatial object">beds</span>, the mother. </sentence><sentence id="3134">And I heard the Germans laughing and drinking and eating. </sentence><sentence id="3135">And I was there 10 days and nobody touch me. </sentence><sentence id="3136">| am still alive. </sentence><sentence id="3137">They took care of me only because they had afraid of the <span class="populated place">Bielskis</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3138">If not, I would not be alive because I had blood all over. </sentence><sentence id="3139">This is from the winter. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3205">Q: <span class="country">Belarus</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3207">A: <span class="country">Belarus</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3209">Q: <span class="country">Belarus</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3210">Q: Yeah. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3211">Q: Tell me the story of <span class="country">Belarus</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3213">A: <span class="country">Belarus</span> was a very rich family, too, not far from them, I think, about 10 miles, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="3214">And the boys, the young boys, they went to take bread and poultry and eggs, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="3215">And they had a very good day then, because they took away all the food from the German. </sentence><sentence id="3216">Yeah and they kill about four, five German. </sentence><sentence id="3217">And they were already tired, the boys. </sentence><sentence id="3218">And this was already night, so they decided to sleep over by the <span class="country">Belarus</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3219">In this time, one from the <span class="populated place">villages</span> saw that the Jewish partisan are by the <span class="country">Belarus</span>, so he gave it to him a letter to the German, the <span class="country">Belarus</span>. " </sentence><sentence id="3220">You should come right away." </sentence><sentence id="3221">They drink a lot, and they were very tired. </sentence><sentence id="3222">They had a very good day. </sentence><sentence id="3223">So the German came and they killed them all. </sentence><sentence id="3224">Only two -- one from the boys, when he saw the German and were -- blood all over. </sentence><sentence id="3225">You know, in the <span class="populated place">villages</span> you have a big, big <span class="spatial object">stove</span>, and under the <span class="spatial object">stove</span> are the chickens sitting. </sentence><sentence id="3226">The chickens are sitting under the <span class="spatial object">stove</span> because there is warm. </sentence><sentence id="3227">So he saw that he doesn't have nowhere to go. </sentence><sentence id="3228">So he went into the place where the chickens are and he -- they spared him. </sentence><sentence id="3229">The German went away. </sentence><sentence id="3230">And he got out and he said, ""What did you do with my friends? </sentence><sentence id="3231">Why did you went to the German?" </sentence><sentence id="3232">What we did to you?" </sentence><sentence id="3233">So he took and he killed them, too, the <span class="country">Belarus</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3234">This another man from the <span class="populated place">villages</span> came and he said -- repeated this to <span class="populated place">Kozlowksi</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3235">Kozlowksi was our man. </sentence><sentence id="3236">Whoever came from the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span>, he was holding him till somebody came to pick him up. </sentence><sentence id="3237">And he told this to the Bielskis, because we didn't know nothing. </sentence><sentence id="3238">Everybody were died. </sentence><sentence id="3239">So this took only about five or 10 days and the Bielskis, Asael, his brother, I don't think Zus was -- Zus was not, I think. </sentence><sentence id="3240">Anyway, the <span class="building">Bielskis</span>, they came and they said to him, "Boys, what did you do?" </sentence><sentence id="3241">He said, "I didn't do nothing. </sentence><sentence id="3242">The German find out and they kill them." </sentence><sentence id="3243">So they took all, about two, three <span class="building">houses</span> from there. </sentence><sentence id="3244">Yes? </sentence><sentence id="3245">And they fix them up, all of them. </sentence><sentence id="3246">One of our partisans, he took a jacket. </sentence><sentence id="3247">A fall jacket, you know, like they're wearing. </sentence><sentence id="3248">And he was looking for something. </sentence><sentence id="3249">So he find a letter from the German. " </sentence><sentence id="3250">Mr. <span class="country">Belarus</span>, thank you very much what you did. </sentence><sentence id="3251">And here is 500 German money, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="3252">And whatever you will find another Jew partisan, you will get it more." </sentence><sentence id="3253">This was <span class="country">Belarus</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3295">Q: So the partisans executed him? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3297">A: Yes, and the whole family. </sentence><sentence id="3298">Yes. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3301">Q: The reprisals like that, do you know if they made a di-- did they get -- were there fewer and fewer incidents? </sentence><sentence id="3302">Did it? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3305">A: Less and less. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3307">Q: So it did some good to-- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3309">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="3310">This was a lesson for the all the <span class="populated place">villages</span>, for all the people. " </sentence><sentence id="3311">Don't do that." </sentence><sentence id="3312">Everybody has the right to live. </sentence><sentence id="3313">They had, they had to do it. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3319">Q: Okay. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3321">A: Lilly's father was there, too, my sister-in-law's. </sentence><sentence id="3322">He was within this partisan what executed the <span class="country">Belarus</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3323">He died there. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3327">Q: Can you talk to me a little bit about the military hierarchy? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3329">A: Yes. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3330">Q: Just sort of any way that you want. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3331">A: You see, there were not too many Jewish -- Jews when they went to the Polish army. </sentence><sentence id="3332">First of all, they didn't want it. </sentence><sentence id="3333">Because the antisemitism was very high there. </sentence><sentence id="3334">So they tried to not to go to the army. </sentence><sentence id="3335">They did something, or bought something that -- but few of them they went to the army. </sentence><sentence id="3336">And they -- when they came to the partisan, they were already -- they knew how to behave in the army. </sentence><sentence id="3337">So when the people who had already about 1,200, 300, so the Bielskis, they divided them in groups. </sentence><sentence id="3338">It's was too much one group. </sentence><sentence id="3339">So everybody was the commander of a group. </sentence><sentence id="3340">A group had about 20 people, 25 people. </sentence><sentence id="3341">So the people what they were in the army, they were the commanders of the group. </sentence><sentence id="3342">And they were listening to them, because they had afraid. </sentence><sentence id="3343">This was a discipline. </sentence><sentence id="3344">Because without the discipline, you couldn't do nothing. </sentence><sentence id="3345">They were complaining, sure, they were complaining. </sentence><sentence id="3346">Who is not complaining?If somebody is eating a piece of meat and you are watching him to eat meat, and you eat only a piece of bread, so sure they were complaining. </sentence><sentence id="3347">They said, "He went for a -- for to take the food, and he was eating the food by himself." </sentence><sentence id="3348">That was not true. </sentence><sentence id="3349">But maybe he put a little more for him. </sentence><sentence id="3350">So they were complaining. </sentence><sentence id="3351">They were complaining that at night nobody were asleep. </sentence><sentence id="3352">There were a couple of people near the groups; they were watching if the German are not coming. </sentence><sentence id="3353">There were about five or six people, they were watching. </sentence><sentence id="3354">So they were complaining, "How come he didn't stay a whole week at night? </sentence><sentence id="3355">He was asleeping, and I was staying." </sentence><sentence id="3356">This was, too. </sentence><sentence id="3357">So they said to him, the <span class="building">Bielskis</span>, "He is the commander. </sentence><sentence id="3358">Whatever he will say, that what you have to do it." </sentence><sentence id="3359">And they got used to that. </sentence><sentence id="3360">They had trouble, too, there. </sentence><sentence id="3361">They had. </sentence><sentence id="3362">All the groups had trouble, sometimes. </sentence><sentence id="3363">But this is minor. </sentence><sentence id="3364">That's nothing. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3400">Q: What about relations with other partisan groups and what about when Platon came in and Russians were assigned to all of the high po-- tell me. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3402">A: Yeah. </sentence><sentence id="3403">We didn't know about the other Russians, they were partisans. </sentence><sentence id="3404">All of them, they were Russian, but Platon was head of the <span class="dlf">puszcza Naliboki</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3405">He was sent from <span class="populated place">Moscow</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3406">So the <span class="building">Bielskis</span> was complaining. " </sentence><sentence id="3407">They took away our food. </sentence><sentence id="3408">They took away our horses. </sentence><sentence id="3409">They took away some, some other things what we were taking this for our partisan." </sentence><sentence id="3410">So Platon was very smart. </sentence><sentence id="3411">He said, "Listen, you Bielskis, you are a Jew. </sentence><sentence id="3412">You have to remember that you have to fight. </sentence><sentence id="3413">You have to fight with them for your survival. </sentence><sentence id="3414">After the war, we will then see what we can do." </sentence><sentence id="3415">So -- but we had trouble, too, with Platon. </sentence><sentence id="3416">He said, "Are you grabbing too much food?" " </sentence><sentence id="3417">What are we grabbing? </sentence><sentence id="3418">Grabbing only bread. </sentence><sentence id="3419">But we are fighting the German." </sentence><sentence id="3420">The same thing, maybe more than that. </sentence><sentence id="3421">But later, in "43 when they separated, the 150 whatever, and they make Ordzonikidze with Zus. </sentence><sentence id="3422">Zus went to them -- Aleks. </sentence><sentence id="3423">So they didn't believe that he will be partial to the Bielskis otriad. </sentence><sentence id="3424">You see, this is the boys were from the <span class="building">Bielskis otriad</span>, from <span class="building">Bielskis Brigade</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3425">You understand? </sentence><sentence id="3426">But they didn't believe him that he will be more partial to Platon than the Bielskis brother. </sentence><sentence id="3427">So they put Panchenko -- not Panchenko -- yeah, Panchenko, I think. </sentence><sentence id="3428">Right? </sentence><sentence id="3429">Panchenko, and he was the commander and Zus was after him. </sentence><sentence id="3430">But they were working very hard and very good. </sentence><sentence id="3431">Once they had incident with another group of partisan. </sentence><sentence id="3432">I told you about it. </sentence><sentence id="3433">They took away the horses, and the rifles, everything. </sentence><sentence id="3434">And Panchenko came in and he said, "What happened?" </sentence><sentence id="3435">One Russian commander, he took the rifle and wanted to shoot to Alex, so Alex took out his revolver and Panchenko came in between and he pushed them together. </sentence><sentence id="3436">And he was very nice with him, Alex. </sentence><sentence id="3437">They did everything together, and very good. </sentence><sentence id="3438">They were working very good. </sentence><sentence id="3439">We didn't have -- only that's was the only one, Panchenko. </sentence><sentence id="3440">Then when Zus, he was the commander of the intelligence of the whole <span class="env feature">forest</span> for the Russian, and for everything. </sentence><sentence id="3441">So they were working very good. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3482">Q: What did he do in that role? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3484">A: Who? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3486">Q: Alex. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3488">A: Alex went 20 yards from the <span class="building">police</span> -- from the Polish. </sentence><sentence id="3489">He went half a kilometer, it's about three-quarters of a mile from the German. </sentence><sentence id="3490">And he was seeing where are they going, and what they are doing, where is the concentrations from them. </sentence><sentence id="3491">This was his doing. </sentence><sentence id="3492">And he reported this everything to Platon. </sentence><sentence id="3493">He did a very good job, and a very big job, because you could not go to fight them if you didn't know what they doing there. </sentence><sentence id="3494">He never go get by himself. </sentence><sentence id="3495">He went always with 10, 15 people on horses. </sentence><sentence id="3496">They were killing. </sentence><sentence id="3497">They were running away. </sentence><sentence id="3498">They had many things. </sentence><sentence id="3499">You cannot say that you were always the best of them. </sentence><sentence id="3500">No. </sentence><sentence id="3501">They were very good, too, the German. </sentence><sentence id="3502">Who is stronger, then, is the winner. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3518">Q: What else did Alex do? </sentence><sentence id="3519">Did he do -- did he have something to do with keeping <span class="dlf">roads</span> open? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3522">A: Yes. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3524">Q: Tell me about that. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3526">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="3527">The <span class="dlf">roads</span> are not like here. </sentence><sentence id="3528">They have one <span class="dlf">road</span> what is going one direction, and the other direction. </sentence><sentence id="3529">And you have smaller <span class="dlf">road</span> that the German didn't know. </sentence><sentence id="3530">But Alex knew. </sentence><sentence id="3531">If this <span class="dlf">road</span> was closed, he was saying to them, "You have to go." </sentence><sentence id="3532">He sent a man to tell him where to go, how to go out from this. </sentence><sentence id="3533">Because one day, I remember this was in the beginning of "44, Platon came with commanders from <span class="populated place">Moscow</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3534">And they went to look for the partisan, how they were working, and how they were doing and everything, and the German came in. </sentence><sentence id="3535">They were surrounding them around, around, and around. </sentence><sentence id="3536">They couldn't go out from there. </sentence><sentence id="3537">So then Asael, his brother, and Alex, they went to see something. </sentence><sentence id="3538">And they saw what happening, so they took him out, but 10 people from the <span class="populated place">Moscow</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3539">This was because they knew how to go out from the <span class="dlf">roads</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3540">You cannot -- you would not be able to use one <span class="dlf">road</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3541">Because even not the <span class="building">markets</span> there was a <span class="dlf">road</span>, but they knew. </sentence><sentence id="3542">I am telling you, they knew. </sentence><sentence id="3543">They were looking on the <span class="env feature">tree</span> and they knew where to go out, how to go out. </sentence><sentence id="3544">And they had a small brother, Aaron. </sentence><sentence id="3545">He is 13 years old. </sentence><sentence id="3546">He knew better than them. </sentence><sentence id="3547">He knew everything. </sentence><sentence id="3548">He was only 13 years old. </sentence><sentence id="3549">He is now 60 something. </sentence><sentence id="3550">He would tell you stories. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3576">Q: Where is he? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3578">A: In <span class="populated place">New York</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3580">Q: Do you know about the early incident in <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span> where Tuvia saw the action? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3582">A: Yes. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3584">Q: Tell me about that. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3586">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="3587">I was still in <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3588">This was only the beginning. </sentence><sentence id="3589">This was like -- the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span> was already -- no, the <span class="populated place">ghetto</span> was not. </sentence><sentence id="3590">This was December. </sentence><sentence id="3591">And they took her out the first 50 people were this; <span class="building">druggists</span>, lawyers, doctors. </sentence><sentence id="3592">Fifty of them. </sentence><sentence id="3593">That was the intelligence of the <span class="populated place">city</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3594">And they killed them, all 50 of them, in the middle of the <span class="building">marketplace</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3595">This was a small <span class="populated place">city</span>, <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span>, with a <span class="building">marketplace</span> where everybody is coming, Thursday and Wednesdays. </sentence><sentence id="3596">And they killed them. </sentence><sentence id="3597">The other ones should be afraid. </sentence><sentence id="3598">Tuvia was there in the <span class="populated place">city</span>, in <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3599">He went for something. </sentence><sentence id="3600">And the German never killed before. </sentence><sentence id="3601">So they ask him who are you? </sentence><sentence id="3602">They didn't have to ask him, because the other one -- somebody told he is a Jew. </sentence><sentence id="3603">They hit him very well. </sentence><sentence id="3604">They beat him up terrible. </sentence><sentence id="3605">He had the first thing that you saw the German. </sentence><sentence id="3606">And they told him to sit here, not to run in no place. </sentence><sentence id="3607">It was a little dark, and he said to himself, "What am I doing here? </sentence><sentence id="3608">If they will kill me, let them kill me when I will not see it. </sentence><sentence id="3609">But to sit and wait for them?" </sentence><sentence id="3610">And he run away. </sentence><sentence id="3611">So this when he came in, already Alex and Asael saw him the first time after two, three weeks. </sentence><sentence id="3612">They were already in the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3613">He came into the <span class="env feature">forest</span> and he said, "I am not going no more. </sentence><sentence id="3614">I am staying with you." </sentence><sentence id="3615">This is the first encounter with the German. </sentence><sentence id="3616">He never went. </sentence><sentence id="3617">And he saw only a German when he kill them or a dead. </sentence><sentence id="3618">Zus -- Alex is wearing still a comm-- jacket for a commander, a German. </sentence><sentence id="3619">He took him alive. </sentence><sentence id="3620">He were looking for eggs, for chickens, him and another three. </sentence><sentence id="3621">And he saw him from far away when he went out from the <span class="dlf">farm</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3622">And he took them alive. </sentence><sentence id="3623">So he said, "Who is the commander?" </sentence><sentence id="3624">He said, "I am the commander." " </sentence><sentence id="3625">So take it off the <span class="spatial object">jacket</span>." </sentence><sentence id="3626">He took it off the jacket, and the other ones, two, three killed and him, he said, "Listen, don't kill me. </sentence><sentence id="3627">I have a wife and children." </sentence><sentence id="3628">He said, "No, no. </sentence><sentence id="3629">We will not kill you. </sentence><sentence id="3630">What did you do with us?" </sentence><sentence id="3631">So he is wearing now the jacket, in all of the books, he is in the jacket from the German. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3678">Q: Did he -- Alex have an incident where he was called a "dirty Jew" on the <span class="dlf">street</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3679">A: Yes. </sentence><sentence id="3680">In <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3681">Q: Yeah. </sentence><sentence id="3682">Tell me about that. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3685">A: In <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span> there was a <span class="building">store</span> for meat. </sentence><sentence id="3686">I don't remember, he told me once what his name was, but I don't remember. </sentence><sentence id="3687">I will not tell you what I don't remember. </sentence><sentence id="3688">And he was -- before the war, he was very good with him. </sentence><sentence id="3689">You see, Alex's <span class="building">house</span> was -- they didn't eat meat what is not kosher. </sentence><sentence id="3690">They had a brother, what was a rabbi. </sentence><sentence id="3691">And the other ones, they were eating, you know. </sentence><sentence id="3692">But he was very good with him. </sentence><sentence id="3693">I forgot his name. </sentence><sentence id="3694">I don't remember. </sentence><sentence id="3695">So they were friends, but when the German came, the friendship went by. </sentence><sentence id="3696">And he had pains in his teeth. </sentence><sentence id="3697">So he went to a dentist. </sentence><sentence id="3698">Still the dentist were alive there, so he went and he saw him from far away. </sentence><sentence id="3699">So you called him, "You dirty Jew. </sentence><sentence id="3700">How come you came here?" </sentence><sentence id="3701">He didn't answer. </sentence><sentence id="3702">He went away, but he was running after him. </sentence><sentence id="3703">He run after him. </sentence><sentence id="3704">And he that saw he doesn't have where to go, so he didn't kill him, but he hit out -- he hit him so much that he was unconscious. </sentence><sentence id="3705">And he went away to the <span class="env feature">forest</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3706">That was the encounter with his best friends. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3729">Q: Was that a common situation or uncommon, would you say? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3731">A: It was common, yeah. </sentence><sentence id="3732">Yeah, this was happening, many things, many. </sentence><sentence id="3733">Because in the times -- in the last times, in the last year in "39, there was the young Polish, the youth, like the youth, the German youth. </sentence><sentence id="3734">That was the same thing in all Europe, the Polish had too, the youth. </sentence><sentence id="3735">And they were very antisemitic and they were trying -- they didn't know yet to kill, but they were beating up. </sentence><sentence id="3736">So who was more, you know, had more force? </sentence><sentence id="3737">So they hitting back and the other ones went away. </sentence><sentence id="3738">But this was in the last year, very common, yes. </sentence><sentence id="3739">It was very uncomfortable. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3749">Q: And it wasn't out of fear, it was out of antisemitism? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3751">A: No, they didn't have fear, no. </sentence><sentence id="3752">No, no. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3755">Q: I was going to ask your husband about getting young fighters, Koscik? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3757">A: <span class="populated place">Kozlowksi</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3759">Q: I don't know. </sentence><sentence id="3760"><span class="populated place">Koscik</span>, K-o-s-c-i-k. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3763">A: Oh, <span class="populated place">Kozaks</span>, yes. </sentence><sentence id="3764">This was his -- <span class="populated place">Moskva</span>" asked for a language, a live language. </sentence><sentence id="3765">They didn't want to kill all of the German. </sentence><sentence id="3766">They wanted more the majors and the captains. </sentence><sentence id="3767">They wanted to talk about it with the German, to know how the positions and everything. </sentence><sentence id="3768">And the -- that's "7 <span class="populated place">Moscow</span> (Russian) there are places in <span class="country">Russia</span>, near <span class="country">Belarussia</span> and <span class="country">Ukraine</span>, the Kozaks"* were alive there and they were working with the German. </sentence><sentence id="3769">So this came from Platon, a word that, "Alex, you have to prepare about two or three Kozaks alive, and you have to bring them to us and we will ask him how is -- how are they doing, the German, where they are staying, how many people, and everything." </sentence><sentence id="3770">So this took him probably about three or four days till he caught up with the <span class="building">Kozaks</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3771">They were terrible fighters, terrible, but they took them alive. </sentence><sentence id="3772">They were washing themselves, cleaning up. </sentence><sentence id="3773">And he with the horse on them, so he took three of them. </sentence><sentence id="3774">He couldn't shlep them, the three of them, so he took only the oldest. </sentence><sentence id="3775">And he brought him to <span class="populated place">Platon</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3776">And they said everything, and everything true. </sentence><sentence id="3777">And this it is. </sentence><sentence id="3778">That's was <span class="populated place">Kozaks</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3779">He did a good job. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3798">Q: Describe the three Bielski brothers each individually. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3800">A: The best for <span class="env feature">nature</span> was <span class="populated place">Asael</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3801">The best. </sentence><sentence id="3802">The strongest from them all, that he -- you cannot buy him with nothing, was Alex. </sentence><sentence id="3803">You couldn't buy him for no money. </sentence><sentence id="3804">If he said that's has to be done, has to be done. </sentence><sentence id="3805">Tuvia had a golden heart. </sentence><sentence id="3806">He said, "I don't care how many will come. </sentence><sentence id="3807">Let them come. </sentence><sentence id="3808">There will be a place for them, all of them." </sentence><sentence id="3809">But the strongest of them was Alex, the strongest of them. </sentence><sentence id="3810">I will tell you. </sentence><sentence id="3811">This was a story when we went out from the <span class="env feature">forest</span>, from the <span class="env feature">jungle</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3812">Yes? </sentence><sentence id="3813">And I came in with him when the groups were already out, and they were organized and everything. </sentence><sentence id="3814">And we saw one woman, a young woman, I think about 32. </sentence><sentence id="3815">And she was standing and crying. </sentence><sentence id="3816">So Alex said to her, "Why you crying?" </sentence><sentence id="3817">She said, "The whole group went by and, you know, the commander, he told me they don't have a place for me." </sentence><sentence id="3818">He said, "Who is the commander?" </sentence><sentence id="3819">He called the name of this commander and he said, "Where he is?" </sentence><sentence id="3820">He said, "Maybe about 10 kilometers, not far. </sentence><sentence id="3821">Because, he told me not to move. </sentence><sentence id="3822">He doesn't want me." </sentence><sentence id="3823">So he run away by himself, on the <span class="spatial object">horse</span>, he took the commander and brought them in where we were staying. </sentence><sentence id="3824">We were staying probably 20 people, the fighters. </sentence><sentence id="3825">He said, "You know her?" </sentence><sentence id="3826">He said, "Yes." " </sentence><sentence id="3827">Why did you let her stay here?" " </sentence><sentence id="3828">I don't have nothing to do with her. </sentence><sentence id="3829">I don't want her." " </sentence><sentence id="3830">What do you mean you don't want her? </sentence><sentence id="3831">You had to take 20 people and she was the 21, so what?" </sentence><sentence id="3832">He said, "I am not taking." </sentence><sentence id="3833">He said, "Okay. </sentence><sentence id="3834">You not taking? </sentence><sentence id="3835">Okay, so you not alive either." </sentence><sentence id="3836">That's was the first kalling of his. </sentence><sentence id="3837">He killed the man. </sentence><sentence id="3838">And this was, you know, this was like from God. </sentence><sentence id="3839">Because every woman and every child had already a place where to go. </sentence><sentence id="3840">Whatever you took her, you have to take her with you. </sentence><sentence id="3841">He was sorry after that because he is not a killer, but he had to do it. </sentence><sentence id="3842">He had to do it. </sentence><sentence id="3843">This was a big accident because he couldn't sleep, and couldn't eat, but this was a very good medicine. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3888">Q: It meant that a lot more people got rescued afterward? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="3890"> "8 Cossacks (Yiddish) </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3891">A: Yes, absolute. </sentence><sentence id="3892">Absolute. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3895">Q: Well, tell me more about the brothers? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3897">A: The brothers were very good together. </sentence><sentence id="3898">Nobody can go in between. </sentence><sentence id="3899">Nobody. </sentence><sentence id="3900">You cannot decide by yourself and no one from them could decide. </sentence><sentence id="3901">They went to the side, the three of them and the baby brother, the 13, he went, too. </sentence><sentence id="3902">And they were thinking up of something and whatever decided is done. </sentence><sentence id="3903">Nobody, not Tuvia by himself, not Asael, or Zusia could decide by himself. </sentence><sentence id="3904">The three of them decided what to do. </sentence><sentence id="3905">And this was the blessing. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3915">Q: And they were all fighters? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3917">A: They were fighters, very good fighters. </sentence><sentence id="3918">They were young, 29, 30, 32 -- six-two. </sentence><sentence id="3919">Everybody had afraid of them. </sentence><sentence id="3920">You will look on them you know that they mean business. </sentence><sentence id="3921">And were good in heart, very good. </sentence><sentence id="3922">Sometime they went out for a couple of days, there were not food, so they had -- whatever they had they were dividing between them. </sentence><sentence id="3923">They were good. </sentence><sentence id="3924">I think the smartest one from all of them, may be not the smartest, the smartest -- more sophisticated was <span class="building">Tuvia</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3925">He was the oldest. </sentence><sentence id="3926">He made his living already, you know. </sentence><sentence id="3927">He went to <span class="building">school</span> more than there. </sentence><sentence id="3928">So maybe, but the hearts was the same. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3941">Q: They were heroes. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3943">A: They were heroes. </sentence><sentence id="3944">Each of them were a hero. </sentence><sentence id="3945">They never had afraid for nothing. </sentence><sentence id="3946">We said "We are surrounding," because we were surrounded not once. " </sentence><sentence id="3947">So what," he said. " </sentence><sentence id="3948">We are only dying once." </sentence><sentence id="3949">I was dying every minute of that. </sentence><sentence id="3950">And they were dying only once. </sentence><sentence id="3951">He said, "There is nothing to be afraid. </sentence><sentence id="3952">You are not with the German now. </sentence><sentence id="3953">We will see who will die and who will live." </sentence><sentence id="3954">They not -- they were never afraid. </sentence><sentence id="3955">They were heroes. </sentence><sentence id="3956">They not coming no more like that. </sentence><sentence id="3957">I don't know. </sentence><sentence id="3958">Maybe that's because they were healthy, from the <span class="populated place">village</span>, from the <span class="env feature">nature</span>, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="3959">They not coming no more. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3977">Q: There was a sad incident with a man named Kaplan. </sentence><sentence id="3978">Do you know what I am talking about? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3981">A: Kaplan? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3983">Q: Yeah. </sentence><sentence id="3984">Do you know what I am talking about? </sentence><sentence id="3985">He, he said, "Those who take the gold can take the people, too." </sentence><sentence id="3986">Do you know about this? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3991">A: No. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="3993">Q: lL asked you at the beginning about a commander named Shematovietz""? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="3995"> "deg Tyan Shematovietz </sentence></p></dialogue><dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="3996">A: <span class="building">Shematovietz</span>. </sentence><sentence id="3997">He was a Russian guy. </sentence><sentence id="3998">He was a very nice guy. </sentence><sentence id="3999">He was a politruk"(r), You know what is a <span class="building">politruk</span>? </sentence><sentence id="4000">A <span class="building">politruk</span> is a man what is teaching the communism. </sentence><sentence id="4001">And he was teaching Communism. </sentence><sentence id="4002">He came from <span class="country">Russia</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4003">So one of the Lubezanski brother what they wanted to be the commander. </sentence><sentence id="4004">So they said to them, "Go ahead. </sentence><sentence id="4005">You can go ahead and take another couple of people and make yourself a commander." </sentence><sentence id="4006">So he came to Platon and he said to Lubezanski, "They are not Communists." </sentence><sentence id="4007">So he said, "How do you know they are not communists, the Bielskis brother?" " </sentence><sentence id="4008">Because I never saw them reading Stalin's words, or Lenin's words." </sentence><sentence id="4009">So the call Shematovietz and he said, "Who said they are not Communists?All of them are Communists. </sentence><sentence id="4010">They are praying every morning for the health of Stalin and Lenin." </sentence><sentence id="4011">You know, we had the Orthodox Jew so they were in the morning five o'clock, six o'clock, they were standing in group and praying. </sentence><sentence id="4012">So he said that is the praying for Stalin and Lenin. </sentence><sentence id="4013">He was a very good guy, an honest guy, a good guy. </sentence><sentence id="4014">They were a couple of very good guys. </sentence><sentence id="4015">Yeah, they're nice guys, Russian guys, very good ones. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4037">Q: Are there any things that you would have done differently or that you think Alex would have done differently? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4039">A: No. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4041">Q: Or <span class="populated place">Tuvia</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4043">A: No. </sentence><sentence id="4044">They did a great job. </sentence><sentence id="4045">Nobody could match them. </sentence><sentence id="4046">Nobody could match them. </sentence><sentence id="4047">If you would find in this time, in the time of the war, a terrible war, a place to go in and to sit quietly for three, four years. </sentence><sentence id="4048">I would sit quietly two and three years. </sentence><sentence id="4049">Nobody should see me. </sentence><sentence id="4050">I would not think about nobody all but myself: Many people are doing like that. </sentence><sentence id="4051">I know a group of people, they were sitting, 10 people, they had a lot of money and they were paying to the <span class="populated place">village</span> soltys"", that's mean like a mayor. </sentence><sentence id="4052">They paying him money, and he was cooking for them and attending them, and everything. </sentence><sentence id="4053">There were not thinking where nobody -- another man to put her in, in the group he should survive, no. </sentence><sentence id="4054">So who could do it without money, without nothing? </sentence><sentence id="4055">They did only for the good hearts what they had. </sentence><sentence id="4056">And they were saying that they were taking money. </sentence><sentence id="4057">They took money, they took jewelry, everything. </sentence><sentence id="4058">We had to pay for the <span class="spatial object">rifles</span> what came from <span class="populated place">Moscow</span> and we send everything to <span class="populated place">Moscow</span>, and they sent it. </sentence><sentence id="4059">But they didn't put nothing, money, in the <span class="spatial object">pockets</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4060">We send for salt, you have to pay this. </sentence><sentence id="4061">You didn't have money, so you paid with jewelry. </sentence><sentence id="4062">You had to buy medicine. </sentence><sentence id="4063">You pay this with jewelry. </sentence><sentence id="4064">But they didn't keep nothing for themselves. </sentence><sentence id="4065">If they would keep so much money, they would be millionaires. </sentence><sentence id="4066">They came out from the war with nothing, with not a penny. </sentence><sentence id="4067">We came to <span class="country">Israel</span> in "45 in October. </sentence><sentence id="4068">We didn't have for what to buy a piece of bread. </sentence><sentence id="4069">So there this the Jewish -- that was not yet -- <span class="country">Israel</span> was in "48. </sentence><sentence id="4070">In "45 it was not <span class="country">Israel</span>, only the people was working there. </sentence><sentence id="4071">So they gave us a <span class="interior space">room</span>, and they give us 25 dollars each and till you will find work. </sentence><sentence id="4072">So if we would have had money, we would do *0 political instructor (<span class="country">Russian</span>) 1 <span class="populated place">village</span> administer (Polish) that? </sentence><sentence id="4073">We didn't have nothing. </sentence><sentence id="4074">We kept out nothing. </sentence><sentence id="4075">We had only a pair of shoes. </sentence><sentence id="4076">They did for the greatness of their heart. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4113">Q: Tell me how the <span class="dlf">otriad</span> came to an end. </sentence><sentence id="4114">Tell me about the -- </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4117">A: Okay. </sentence><sentence id="4118">This was "45, "44. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4121">Q: Forty-five? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4123">A: Forty-five in June. </sentence><sentence id="4124">I was sitting in the <span class="env feature">forest</span> and we heard <span class="spatial object">trucks</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4125">So we were sure that the German army is going to surround the -- around -- to take us around. </sentence><sentence id="4126">So we were sitting quietly. </sentence><sentence id="4127">So then <span class="populated place">Tuvia</span> was a little farther than us. </sentence><sentence id="4128">Zus said, "No, that is impossible," because they didn't go by <span class="spatial object">trucks</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4129">They went by <span class="spatial object">tanks</span>, the German, around. </sentence><sentence id="4130">That's not like a <span class="spatial object">truck</span> -- not like a <span class="spatial object">tank</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4131">That's much lighter sounding. </sentence><sentence id="4132">So he went with another couple of men more to the -- to this <span class="dlf">road</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4133">And he saw the <span class="building">Red Army</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4134">When he saw the Red Army, he said, "Come on, the German are gone. </sentence><sentence id="4135">The <span class="building">Red Army</span> is already here." </sentence><sentence id="4136">And they saw him, so they came with the rifles like that to us. " </sentence><sentence id="4137">Who are you, traitors? </sentence><sentence id="4138">You not? </sentence><sentence id="4139">Who are you?" </sentence><sentence id="4140">and took about two, three hours till they recognize that we are partisan. </sentence><sentence id="4141">And we went after them right away. </sentence><sentence id="4142">They went to the front and we went to the <span class="populated place">city</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4143">We went to <span class="populated place">Novogrudok</span> and there we were staying there for a couple of days, maybe 10 days. </sentence><sentence id="4144">And the Red Army came in and said, "You have to go to the army. </sentence><sentence id="4145">You are partisan. </sentence><sentence id="4146">You are fighters, but now you have to fight with us on the -- across -- against the German." </sentence><sentence id="4147">Then they took Asael he was-- because they saw him a first. </sentence><sentence id="4148">So they took him right away to the army, and he died in the front in <span class="populated place">Prussia</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4149">And they let Zus and Tuvia to stay with the people. </sentence><sentence id="4150">They should stay with the children, with the woman, whatever. </sentence><sentence id="4151">That's what -- how we survived. </sentence><sentence id="4152">We came to the <span class="populated place">city</span> together with them. </sentence><sentence id="4153">And they tried to give us papers that we are partisan. </sentence><sentence id="4154">And this was the end of that. </sentence><sentence id="4155">Later, they came from <span class="country">Russia</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4156">They came, and they organize whatever they have to organize for the people what they stayed there. </sentence><sentence id="4157">This all the end of that. </sentence><sentence id="4158">Whatever they saw the Russian, you had a watch or something, they took it away by themselves. </sentence><sentence id="4159">They were robbing, too. </sentence><sentence id="4160">You know, like a <span class="dlf">front</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4199">Q: Did you tell me everything about -- did we do everything we should about <span class="populated place">Lubezanski</span>? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4201">A: <span class="populated place">Lubczanski</span>, they were a very bad boys. </sentence><sentence id="4202">They were two brothers. </sentence><sentence id="4203">There were always, always, you know, complaining. </sentence><sentence id="4204">They said, "They are not Communists, they are fascists. </sentence><sentence id="4205">And they are taking money and jewelry from the people." </sentence><sentence id="4206">And they went in to <span class="populated place">Platon</span> even. </sentence><sentence id="4207">So they called the Bielskis brother, the three of them they went, and he told them what are the Lubczanskis doing. </sentence><sentence id="4208">So Platon said, "Kill them. </sentence><sentence id="4209">Kill them." </sentence><sentence id="4210">But, you know, we saw already the end of this everything, so they didn't touch them. </sentence><sentence id="4211">They didn't touch them. </sentence><sentence id="4212">They told them only, "Go away we should not see you." </sentence><sentence id="4213">This is it. </sentence><sentence id="4214">And they still alive. </sentence><sentence id="4215">They are still alive in <span class="populated place">New York</span>. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4231">Q: Are there any other things you want to tell me? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4233">A: We talk about everything. </sentence><sentence id="4234">What can I say more? </sentence><sentence id="4235">You went through everything. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4239">Q: You don't have any rememberances of stories you should tell me that I didn't ask? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4241">A: No. </sentence><sentence id="4242">You went over everything. </sentence><sentence id="4243">Everything. </sentence><sentence id="4244">There in the partisan were these two friends of mine, they were writing everything every day, a <span class="spatial object">diary</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4245">And now, she will write a book about it. </sentence><sentence id="4246">They were mostly not -- you know, they were sitting in the <span class="env feature">forest</span> and only thinking how to survive, how to survive. </sentence><sentence id="4247">That was the only thing. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4255">Q: And it was a very unusual situation where you fought. </sentence><sentence id="4256">Everywhere else people didn't know in time or only the young unattached people fought? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4259">A: Correct. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4261">Q: There weren't heroes that rescued? </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4263">A: No, no, no. </sentence><sentence id="4264">The heroes was only the brothers Bielskis. </sentence><sentence id="4265">Alright, they had help. </sentence><sentence id="4266">I said before, they couldn't be a partisan <span class="building">Bielskis</span> if they didn't have the all people. </sentence><sentence id="4267">They were young people. </sentence><sentence id="4268">They were fighting with them. </sentence><sentence id="4269">They were doing everything what they told them. </sentence><sentence id="4270">And because of them, there are the <span class="building">Bielskis partisan otriad</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4271">Because without them, I don't know. </sentence><sentence id="4272">What do you think? </sentence><sentence id="4273">Nothing. </sentence><sentence id="4274">Whoever will survive, survive, and that's the end of that. </sentence><sentence id="4275">And like that a whole generations, two, three generations are still alive because of the Bielskis brothers. </sentence><sentence id="4276">And all over the world are they, all over the world. </sentence><sentence id="4277">And sometimes we are coming in touch with them for a wedding from the grandchildren. </sentence><sentence id="4278">The wedding. </sentence><sentence id="4279">And they said, "Listen to me, what would be without the <span class="building">Bielskis</span>? </sentence><sentence id="4280">What would -- we would not have children, and grandchildren, nothing. </sentence><sentence id="4281">We have to thank them." </sentence><sentence id="4282">But not always was like that. </sentence><sentence id="4283">No. </sentence><sentence id="4284">But when you getting older and smarter and you see many things in other perspectives. </sentence><sentence id="4285">You didn't see this before, but now, when you going to bar mitzvah, you going to a wedding for your grandchild and you think, "Listen | did it. </sentence><sentence id="4286">I did it with the help of the <span class="building">Bielskis</span>." </sentence><sentence id="4287">This is something. </sentence><sentence id="4288">Something. </sentence><sentence id="4289">They are in the <span class="building">army</span>, they are all over, professors, doctors. </sentence><sentence id="4290">Everything you have. </sentence><sentence id="4291">Every -- many, many doctors. </sentence><sentence id="4292">And they said, "I am giving all of my life for the poor, for the old." </sentence><sentence id="4293">And they are like that. </sentence><sentence id="4294">Many. </sentence><sentence id="4295">They going away to <span class="country">Israel</span> ina <span class="populated place">kibbutz</span>. </sentence><sentence id="4296">You know what's a <span class="populated place">kibbutz</span>? </sentence><sentence id="4297">And they working there and they trying everythin. </sentence><sentence id="4298">They put everything aside here the money, and they working there, "because I have to remember what they did for my parents once. </sentence><sentence id="4299">People -- brother Bielskis, what they didn't know even us." </sentence><sentence id="4300">And this something. </sentence><sentence id="4301">Something when you are going out and you see all of them on a wedding or something. </sentence><sentence id="4302">How the young generation is dancing and singing and comes a professor from Harva-- or from this -- or from <span class="building">Columbia University</span> and said, "Wait a second" -- we had a 50 anniversary, me and Alex, two years ago and came two professors, I never heard about them, I never knew them -- "I have to remind you of something. </sentence><sentence id="4303">Remember one thing, because of" -- the other brothers are not alive. </sentence><sentence id="4304">He said, "Because of the brothers, and <span class="populated place">Zusia</span>, we are still here. </sentence><sentence id="4305">And we have our families, and thanks to him." </sentence><sentence id="4306">This is something, you know, when you are sitting and you hear this. </sentence><sentence id="4307">You know, your heart is pounding, pounding. </sentence><sentence id="4308">You think, "Really, was it like that?" </sentence><sentence id="4309">And this was really like that. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4357">Q: Well, thank you, Sonia. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4359">A: It's an honor to be with you. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4361">Q: It's an honor to be with you. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4363">A: It's an honor to be with you. </sentence><sentence id="4364">You making this so easy. </sentence><sentence id="4365">I am not a nervous person, but in the morning, I said to my son, I said, "You know what, I am afraid." </sentence><sentence id="4366">He said, "Mommy, what are you afraid? </sentence><sentence id="4367">You be only you." </sentence><sentence id="4368">And this is the true. </sentence><sentence id="4369">You are only you. </sentence><sentence id="4370">Tell whatever you know. </sentence><sentence id="4371">And you making this easy. </sentence><sentence id="4372">Not everybody has it -- some, you know. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4383">Q: Thank you. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Answer"><p><sentence id="4385">A: Thank you again. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class="Question"><p><sentence id="4387">Q: Okay. </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
<dialogue class=""><p><sentence id="4389"> End of Tape #3 Conclusion of interview </sentence></p></dialogue> |
|
</body> |
|
</html> |
