Small Riga Ghetto

17
He saw to it that they met each year to mourn together, always in the month
when the two large operations had taken place, in November and/or December
1941. Several of the German Jews came to mourn together with their Latvian
counterparts, but he remained cool and reserved.
At times I thought we were closer just because I was a child in the ghetto,
but I had a rude awakening one day, when I asked him to let me have names of
his friends still in Riga, so that I could meet with them when I would soon be
there. He wanted to know my purpose for going to "his" city and I told him
that I would be doing research for the purpose of my doctoral dissertation, that
had been approved by my University's History Department. He asked "Isn't
my book enough? It could always be translated!” I said that while I considered
his book an important source, I was to write a documented study about the
thousands of deportees who had been sent there, and of whom very few came
back. He looked at me coldly and said "They are not important."
I did not speak to him for several years and avoided the commemoration, but
when my first book Journey Into Terror: Story of the Riga Ghetto was published,
he came to The City College of New York, where I was teaching, and
sincerely apologized.
Much later my publisher told me that Kaufmann had bought 100 copies of
my book and given instruction to send them to all his friends, all over the
world. From then on, I was a speaker at every annual commemoration, and
when a few of us, with his blessings, founded the Jewish Survivors of Latvia,
Inc., I became a Vice President and Editor of the Latvian Jewish Courier.
In 1985 I announced that I was ready for a sequel to Journey Into Terror,
and asked for our members to come forward with especially interesting events
they remembered from the war years. Kaufmann came to me and asked that I
translate the chapter "Bloody Sloka" from his book, where he wrote of Arthur's
murder. I did so, but he died only a few weeks before my second book,
Muted Voices: Jewish Survivors of Latvia Remember was introduced to the
public at the Graduate School of City University of New York in October
1987. In his honor, I gave the copyright of my book to the Jewish Survivors of
Latvia, Inc., so that the earnings could be used for the members.
I just think how happy he would be at this time, if he knew that his complete
book will be published. The late Boris Kliot paid for the translation, but he
neglected to teach the translator the various words we used in the ghettos and
in the camps, a jargon that does not lend itself to the usual translation. He
meant well, but it took me a very long time to bring order into chaos. Furthermore,
when Kaufmann wrote the book in the two years following the war,