Dra. Olia Goldfayn
SURVIVED TO BE A WITNESS
(Letters Fragments)
In a series of
previous writings, we mention Dr. Mrs. Goldfayn . She escaped from Lineve rail station , while was sent first
transport of people evacuated from Pruzhany toward Auschwitz (January 28 1943)
During 18 months she hid in a Catholic Church, and remained there as nun. She was witness of Jews extermination in
many cities and small villages. When the area was liberated of Nazi occupants, Dr. Goldfayn by intervention of writer YLYA ERENBURG traveled to Moscow. She told him details about
nazis cruelty, then went back to Pruzhany passing through different D. P. (Displaced People) Camps in
Czechoslovakia, Germany, Austria,
France and finally arrived to Israel. Next we reproduce some fragments
of her letters sent to relatives and to Landsmen. These fragments will complete
many details. This chapter deals about the destruction of our native towns and
how they look now.
I) OF A LETTER TO HER AUNT, PAULINA NAIDUS, BRONX, US
Moscow, November 15, 1944
... I will try to transmit a short summary. At the beginning they had us
in Pruzhany Ghetto 19 consecutive months. There we saw daily as they tortured
people, until many perished for wounds and
hunger. From January 28 to 30
1943, was very cold. We were transported to Linowo train station. Took
three days to Nazis to introduce us by
force in boxcars, in order to transport us toward an "unknown place."
It is impossible to describe tragedies happened when they introduced by
force inside boxcars, to women, men and children, as if we were animals. There
are not words neither language that can express the martyrdom and cruelty that
was done to us. Maybe you already received an idea about Nazi's bestiality,
through press .
Some minutes before Nazis closed boxcars, I observed surroundings, and
when not seeing any guard, I jumped of the train and ran until finding a Polish
monastery. During 18 consecutive months, I was next to a Polish nun, wondered
from one place to another, we stopped for " davenen " (Jewish prayer)
when finding a church, and the enemy did not doubt about my authenticity as a
nun.
Yes, I acted my role successfully, never pronounced a word that could
invite to suspect my characteristic
role, but deep wounds in my heart not
even began to be treated, and every moment my anguish grew. It is impossible for me to transmit how much our
Jews supported. I saw it with my own eyes. I was able to survive, but my heart doesn't silence neither one minute.
If at some time you read "The Hell" by Dante, even so you don't
imagine what happened to us.
I was with them from the day that we ere locked in the Ghetto
until the moment of jumping form the train. I am sure their end was Treblinka or Maidanek, and you will not need any
more explanation....
June 28 1944 I was liberated of my suffering.
September 6, I returned to Pruzhany. Everything was burnt. Everything left with Nazi's smoke.
Nobody is alive. I was not able neither for one minute to liberate myself the
sight of my siblings and sisters , relatives and well-known, and also neighbors
that demand me vengeance.
My dear friends! It is your duty
to retaliate those that murdered our Jews. You should be witness, the Nazi
should pay for the cruel and terrible murders.
I am the only witness, and I saw all that Jews suffered in our native
town. My heart is wounded like the heart of a mother that suffers for her sick
and aching son.
I was a normal person, until experiencing all calamities in own flesh
and blood, that aged me and made me
feel little bit a hero. Many men of our
town could not support this situation and they committed suicide.
My dear people: don't cry, tears are vain. We in the Ghetto didn't cry,
even our small children didn't cry. I
lost my husband, a brother, nephews and nieces, many childhood well-known
friends of my native town where I worked as MD. Only me and some few others
returned alive, those that were partisans.
I had the opportunity to see a hunt, but such a bestial persecution to
people is terrible to imagine. Hitler hung posters with the inscription that we
Jews are not are human beings, and therefore he should exterminate us. The
famous war correspondent YLYA ERENBURG called me to go to Moscow. I transmitted
him some episodes of what I saw and experienced. To transmit all that were
tortured our dear people, we would need to write a book....
II) OF A LETTER SENT TO HER SISTER, BROTHER-IN-LAW, JEWS OF PRUZHANY IN
ISRAEL, ESPECIALLY TO ABRAHAM BRESKY
Kofenberg, Austria,
October 23, 1945
... I wrote to US and I tried to create a fund among Pruzhany, Malech
and Shereshev Landsmen to remember for
ever the memory of victims of our area that were exterminated in crematories,
and to create a settlement in Eretz Israel that gathers the 140 survivors that
will arrive there (if it's new owners, the Englishmen, allow them and they
don't annihilate them).
It could be an appropriate Memorial of innocent victims. Will be
convenient that would lead this event YTZHOK YANOVITSH's brother, who was an outstanding
representative of Jewish Council in the
Ghetto, and lives in US. I registered the name of this person in all documents
included in Moscow's black book. When I said goodbye to him January 28 1943,
the first day of the expulsion of Pruzhany, in presence of VELVEL SHRAIBMAN he
told me: "Olya escape, survive, and where you will stay will be a witness
of our extermination".
I leave Poland, my desire is to meet our Landsmen in Feldofing, near
Munich. There is SOLIE NITZBERG, ZALMAN
URIEVITSH, MOISHE CHAIKIN, SENDER ZAKHEIM, and other 25 men. How much I miss
them! They called me, and although I am
weak and sick I travel there to be with
them.
Dear friends of Pruzhany! Don't forget our siblings and children that
remain in the camps of Germany and Austria, physically destroyed and
psychically wounded. These heroes crossed the dark road of their life, but with
honesty and dignity. You should make possible to take them out as soon as
possible of camps, don't forget them because it is enormous our grief.
The only thing that interests me in life is to be able to do something
for my siblings of Pruzhany. They see me like a mother and they want me to
live. If I don't end up being alive, occupy my place. Remember!
III) OF A LETTER SENT TO ABRAHAM BRESKY IN ISRAEL
Dear friend Bresky!
I received your letter. I would like so much to meet you, to embrace your neck, and to cry during
much, much time. Our pain can be understood it by those who lived it. Until
today I don't know what happens. when I listen passing though some people saying they don't understand how
we gave those victims to the beasts. I answer them that this happened because
the intimate collaboration of G-d and our neighbors (T.N: an irony) . In France
there was not guards, and 45% was exterminated. French helped to save Jewish
lives. We were all sunk in such a pig-pen, and all, all helped Hitler to
exterminate us. Now illustrious come and say we were sheep
You are interested in Pruzhany. I will tell you some things: I was liberated near Lublin July 26 1944. Brest
was not yet liberated, but as we could not arrive to Pruzhany because all
bridges were destroyed, then I thought that we could pursue "him",
the Devil, to Berlin. I sat down on a tank, and ran with Red Army toward the
Vístula.
You may imagine my pain and cholera. They were so big, that I didn't
feel fatigue neither hunger. I participated in terrible fights. The sky was
broken, and worse, I didn't feel fear. I drove cars and squashed German bodies,
which under the wheels were broken as ointment. This cured a little my heart
. From Dembling, I was with the first
Ukrainian front that moved toward Baltic Sea. It is very difficult to tell all
that I lived, but with dear Russian I felt as fish in the water. Then in Kovel
I offered to mobilize myself in Red Army. I didn't want to leave the
battlefront. I wished to enter Berlin with Red Army ...But when they saw my
aspect, they told me to return home in Pruzhany.
... .I was dressed this way; I had a knotted handkerchief on the head, a
rural skirt, barefoot, got this way on
each tribune to preach, I spoke and spoke without stopping. I had thousand
listeners', of Red Army, Generals and Officials, they took me on their arms
because of my words. I received a certificate as Jewish survivor, and Red Army
took me all parts. In synthesis I made a good course. I ran from one front to
another Imagine, I that feared thunders
and lightning, here in the battlefront the seven skies were broken, and was for
me as listening a symphony of Beethoven.
When met third Ukrainian front
with first Byelorussian front, headed by Marshal Zhukov that went from Minsk,
it cannot be imagined a more beautiful painting. Ah!! Russian are the heroes.
...I didn't stop laughing at the grotesque aspect of Germans. Without
pants, bearded, mangy... Not only their
bodies trembled, but also the rags with which used to cover themselves. Then
I entered with Red Army to Pruzhany, There were already about forty partisans
...
The city was burned in 60%... .The fourth transport had left Pruzhany
going to Aushwitz. They transported 70 families to the mount between Pruzhany
and Linovo. Behind the barracks the gentiles liberated the horses from the
sticks that united them to the carts, and with the wooden sticks murdered all Jews. The gentiles together with Germans stole all that was there.
Poles. German and some Byelorussian entered the Ghetto, dug
everything, broke each wall, looked
for gold and elements of value
among excrements of the closet
Two names: LIMA and MISHEN, two youths from Poland that worked with
TITKE, German Major's representative.
They hung themselves. LIZE PINSKY was found in a near village, they
brought her to the city, she requested that they leave her with the face
against the floor for not seeing as they shot her, but they did not grant her this pleasure. Other
hundreds calamities could I tell.
... .Reb ZELIK GOLDFAYN's grandson, LASIE GITKIN: a Christian of
Novidvor tied him together with the son-in-law of YOSEF SELETZKY called SAVITZKY. Also tied the son of
BUCH'HALTER called LASIE. He gave gold
and value articles, told he was my nephew, I made so much for him, but nothing
helped. They shot them. NEACHKE and AVREMEL GAIDAMAK were murdered by Christians
in the forest. This happened 6 weeks before
liberation of the area.
...When I arrived in Poland some people of our District stopped me, and
others escaped with Germans. Without
ant doubt they had fear. KASHMAN (the Major who participated in Ghetto Jews
killing ) was murdered in Velovezsh,
while he escaped with best Jewish
Pesach china....