Irina Zamansky / Gary Nachshen Correspondence
Irina Zamansky to Gary Nachshen - January 23, 2003
Dear Gary Nachshen,
Please allow mw to introduce myself first. My name is Irina Zamansky (born Geller). My family came to the US in 1991 from Russia.
I am writing this letter, because while researching our family history, I found your publications about pogroms in Pogrebishche in 1919. Then, following the search, I found your wonderful Nachshen Family Circle website. I read about your family and had a feeling of attachment to their history. May be our families had some connections in the past? May be they were hiding together from the pogromshchiks or tried to protect their loved ones? Most likely, your grandfather Jack, who had such a great memory, would remember them, but unfortunately it is too late to ask him...
So, let s go back to the facts. In your article about the August 1919 pogrom you referenced an original document published in Yiddish by the YIVO Institute in 1965. You have also indicated, that translation was prepared by Janie Respitz of Montreal. I am very much interested in learning more details about this document. I know that my great grandfather Shakhno Geller and his sons were members of the Pogrebishche Jewish self-defense group, and he (Shakhno) and one of his sons, were killed during this pogrom.
I would greatly appreciate if I could obtain an original translation of the document or if you could refer me to other sources of information about this pogrom. I hope to find there information about my family.
There is another, very slight chance, that you or any member of your family actually knew or heard of anyone from the Gellers family who immigrated to America at the beginning of 20th century. Below is the family information that I gathered from the older relatives and from some genealogical sources.
Here is the story.
Our roots are from Moishe GELLER and his wife Frima (maiden name unknown). They lived in Voronovitsa and moved to Pogrebishche in 1860th-1870th. Moishe was a blacksmith.
They had 5 sons and 1 daughter: Shmulek (Samuyil), Shakhno, Hershel, Mendel, Itzhak, and Nechame.
At the beginning of the 20th century 3 brothers: Shakhno, Hershel and Mendel, and sister Nechame left Pogrebishche and immigrated to the U.S.
Shakhno was 36 years old at that time (born in 1874). He also was a blacksmith. His wife Beila and 4 kids (Moisha - my grandfather, Boruch, Shika and Charna) stayed in Pogrebishche, and Shakhno later returned back to Russia (year is unknown, but it was before the 1917 Bolshevik revolution). Probably the intension was to bring the whole family back to America, but according to the family legend, WW I and the Bolshevik revolution did not allow them to leave the country. Shakhno and his son Shika were killed in 1919 Pogrebishche in pogrom. His widow was raising three kids in the Soviet Union (they all moved to Kiev). It took more than 60 years for great-grandfather Shakhno s descendants to be able to immigrate (again!) to the United States. Moishe's son Shakhno, who is my father and who was named after his grandfather, lives in San Diego. I am his only daughter and also live in San Diego with my husband and younger daughter. Older daughter lives in NJ with our 6-year-old granddaughter. Boruch's son and Charna's daughter with their kids now live in New York.
From the first day of coming to America I was dreaming to find another part of the family: two brothers and a sister, who left Pogrebishche at about the same time when Shakhno did. I hope they were luckier than their brother Shakhno.
Searching Ellis Island documents I found, that Herschel arrived to New York on October 11, 1910 on the ship Kroonland from Antwerp, Belgium. He was 26, married (his wife Reizl and a daughter also stayed in Ukraine). And there is no more information about them. He was a baker.
I did not find a passenger record for Nechame, but she came before Herschel and she was single at the time. She was a seamstress and had a laundry/alteration business in Brooklyn. She got married soon and had a son, Morris BEKERMAN (born 1912-1913). I learned this information from Moishe Geller, Shmulek's son of the same age, who lived in the Soviet Union and exchanged letters with Moris in 1920th. During the WW II all information about American relatives was lost.
Mendel also came to America at about the same time (~ 1910), but there is no information about his arrival. I know he was a teacher and he was single.
Unfortunately, my research stops here. I was trying to look into Census records, into Social Security Death Indices, but without any luck. The biggest problem is that Geller is a very popular name.
I greatly appreciate your time and apologize for bringing all this information that might be not relevant at all, to your attention. Any word of advice, information or links helping with my search, would be greatly appreciated.
Sincerely,
Irina Zamansky
Oceanside, CA
Shakhno Geller, c. 1910.
Beili Geller (Shakhno's wife) and children (c. 1910). From left to right: Boruch, Moishe (my grandfather), Shika (killed in 1919), Charna.
Gary Nachshen to Irina Zamansky - January 28, 2003
Irina:
I was thrilled beyond words to receive your letter. As I was away on holiday last week and have been busy catching up with work since my return, it has not been possible for me to reply to you until now.
To begin with, the document on our family website to which you are referring is, for the most part, an English translation of a chapter from a book published by the YIVO Institute in New York in 1965 in Yiddish, written by Elias Chericover. The only part of the document which is mine is the introduction, which I prepared to try and give some context for what follows. The chapter concerns the pogroms led by a Ukrainian partisan leader named Zeleny, including the pogrom in Pogrebishche. So you already have on the website his description of the pogrom. I have the original Yiddish book, and I believe it contains a few other stray references to Pogrebishche, but I can't read Yiddish and I'm not inclined at this time to spend more money on a translation of the rest of the book.
The family website also has the text of an eyewitness account of the August 1919 Pogrebishche pogrom, taken from a book published in 1927 in Paris (around the time of the trial of Simon Petlura's assassin there), which I translated from the French. I just took a quick look at the website and couldn't find this other translation, but I'm sure if you root around enough you will find it. If you can't, please let me know and I'll ask my uncle, our family webmaster, to find it for us.
I have lots of other books about the 1919 pogroms in general, in English and French, most of which date back to the 1920s. I'd be happy to send you a list if you'd like. I have been accumulating my collection gradually from used book store catalogues around the world listed on the Internet. But none of them focus on the Pogrebishche pogrom per se. If you're truly interested, I'd be delighted to photocopy any bits about that pogrom and send them to you, if you provide me your address.
The Geller name is not one I recognize. Our family came to Montreal in the 1920s, and I know that at least two other families from Pogrebishche ended up in Montreal around the same time, the Drabkins and the Skarfs (Shkarofsky). Are you related to either of those families?
I have never been to Pogrebishche, or anywhere in the Ukraine or Russia, but it is my dream to visit one day. Were you ever in Pogrebishche? Do you have any memories or photographs? Our family would love to share them, if you do.
Anyway, if it is OK with you I am going to pass this exchange of correspondence on to my uncle to post on the website. Please let me know one way or the other. Maybe something in your message will jog someone's memory, and we can establish a connection between our two families.
Gary Nachshen
Irina Zamansky to Gary Nachshen - January 30, 2003
Gary,
Thank you very much for your nice letter. I understand that your time is limited and appreciate your quick response.
Regarding the book in Yiddish by Elias Cherikover: I will try to get in touch with the YIVO Institute and to order the book. At the same time, if it is not too much trouble for you and you can copy pages from your collection related to the Pogrebishche pogrom, I d really appreciate it. My father might be able to read Yiddish (he studied it at school and I hope he remembers some of it). We would be happy to share with you any additional information we might gather and translate from those pages.
By the way, I found also an eyewitness text in Russian (her name was Sonya Liumkis), where she describes the horrors of pogroms in Pogrebishche and near by villages (Tetiev and Zhivotov) led by Sokolov s bandits. This text is taken from an article of Sergei Doondin in the magazine Foreigner ( Inostranets , 21 (426), 18.6.2002, p. 41-43).
She mentioned the name of the head of the Jewish community in the village Zhivotov - Could it be related to the names of Skarfs (Shkarofsky), that you mentioned in your letter? If you are interested in obtaining this text, I could translate it (but cannot promise to do it quickly).
The names of Drabkins and Skarfs do not sound familiar.
Thank you for reference to the Paris book translation.
I have never been to Pogrebishche, but I would like to go there one day. My father was born there (in 1923). He does not remember too much (they went to Kiev when he was 3 or 4 years old), but he remembers his dad s blacksmith shop. My great grandfather Shakhno and my grandfather Moisey both were blacksmiths.
Answering your question about memories and photos: there is almost nothing left from the family archives, because they lived in Kiev and lost everything during the WWII. Both my father and my grandfather were in the Soviet Army fighting fascists, and women of the family ran from fascist s occupation without any belongings. When they returned to their apartment after the war, it was nothing there&
We have only two old family photos: one is my great grandfather Shakhno before his departure to America, and another one his family (wife and 4 children). It was taken for him (I guess also before he left or may be while he was there), so he could look at it while he was away. You will find these photos in the attachment.
Please feel free to share this correspondence and use it at your discretion.
Thank you again for your reply. I hope we will continue to exchange our findings.
Best wishes,
Irina