I would like to take this opportunity
to share with you, my fellow countrymen, the impression that
our town Felshtin made on me when I visited there a few years
ago.
I
was attracted to Felshtin like a magnet. I wanted to see, with
my own eyes, if the destruction of our town was as great as the
people here in America portrayed it to be. It was on a Friday
afternoon, May 12, 1931, when my youngest daughter, Leahle, and
I arrived in Felshtin.
"It was
as if they wanted to pull themselves out of their graves to protest
against the evil servants of the inquisition..."
Dear friends, my trip to Felshtin
was a number of years back and today, as I write these words,
my limbs are stiff, my speech is poor, my pen shakes, my memory
lacking, and it is difficult to describe the impression that
the town and its inhabitants made on me. Truth be told, I have
waited a long time; yet, even in my worst nightmares, I could
never have imagined such loneliness and darkness.
I
do not exaggerate, my friends and countrymen, when I say that
it appeared to me that ever person I encountered, man, woman
and child, made the same impression. It was as if they wanted
to pull themselves out of their graves to protest against the
evil servants of the inquisition.
Every
single one, with no exception, was a skeleton, skin and bones,
emaciated from hunger, naked and barefoot, in the full sense
of the word. It was just impossible for me to describe these
people. Even the wealthy, who at one time played an important
role in Felshtin, were now equal to the poor. In every town I
visited, I found the people bloated from hunger. I met young
mothers with infected lungs whose husbands had either died or
been drafted into the army, leaving them desolate and alone,
wandering around with their hungry children crying for a little
bread (mostly from baked bran) that cost two rubles and 50 kopeks
a pound. Not everyone had the fortune of acquiring this valuable
commodity!
Most
of the homes were barren. No furniture, no beds; they slept on
mattresses made of boards. The houses were covered in black soot
that had accumulated over the years. I saw workers -- those who
had the good fortune of finding work -- especially the bourgeois,
old white bearded Jews, naked and barefoot, going miles to twist
rope. Many worked in the fields.
One
afternoon a certain Moshe Avrohom hitched up his wagon and brought
the workers a pot of black grain and a quarter pound of bread
for each worker. This was their entire sustenance for the day,
their compensation for the day's work.
"I left
... with the firm determination to help ... these poor half-dead
men, women and children of Felshtin."
A
few of the girls of Felshtin worked twisting mesh and earning
five kopeks for producing 28 inches of it. I spent eight sad
days sharing the suffering of my countrymen, helping them as
much as I could. I gave them everything I owned!
The
day I left was like Yom Kippur in town. I left with a broken
heart, but with the firm determination to help them myself, and
see to it that others also help these poor half-dead men, women
and children of Felshtin.
Translated from Yiddish
to English by Sora Ludmir. © Copyright 1999 by the Felshtin
Society, a New Jersey nonprofit corporation. From Felshteen;
zamulbukh lekoved tsum ondenk fun di Felshteener kdoyshim ©Copyright 1937 First
Felshteener Benevolent Association.
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