Small Riga Ghetto

29
Part I
The History
of the Jewish Kibbutz (Community) in Latvia
In order to give a precise picture of the Jewish community in Latvia to my
countrymen who have not been in Latvia for a long time, I have decided to
summarize briefly the history of the Jewish community up to the German invasion
of Latvia.
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A small Latvia was created from the former Russian provinces of Courland
and Livland, as well as part of the province of Vitebsk, with the help of the
half-Jew Zigfrīds Meierovics (his father, Dr. Meierowitz, was a Jew).
Latvia consisted of four provinces: Latgale, Vidzeme, Zemgale and Kurzeme.
In 1941 it had about 100,000 Jews. Most of the Jews, about 40,000,
lived in the capital city, Riga; next in terms of their Jewish population were
the cities of Daugavpils and Liepāja. As far as small towns go, Jews generally
preferred the province of Latgale and liked Vidzeme the least. Besides being
good craftsmen and very talented skilled workers, the Jews made up the largest
proportion of merchants in the large cities and small towns. Latvian companies
in all industries were also highly developed by the Jews (Milmann, R. Kaplan,
the Hoff brothers, K. Misroch, R. Feldhuhn and others). The export and import
of raw materials and finished products was in Jewish hands (Behrmann,
Rosengarten, Schalit etc.) because of their good connections with the outside
world. The Jewish bankers, for example the Lewstein brothers, Schmuljan and
Epstein (from Liepāja) were also well-known abroad. Large and small banks
were founded with Jewish capital (the Nordic Bank and others). The founders
of the Nordic Bank were Leiba Minsker, Ber Lewitas, Rabinowitsch, Kirschbaum
and others. Leading positions were held by Saul Gurewitsch and
Silitzki.
After Latvia became independent, it was the Jews who introduced it to the
world and more or less got it off the ground. Latvia's good economic standing
was created by the Jews alone. The Latvians themselves are an industrious
farming people. For years they were subjugated by the German barons and had
no talent for trade. Only a few Latvians became manufacturers, with the help
of the Latvian government (1935), which endeavored to create a purely Latvian
industrial sector. This effort, however, cost the Latvian government quite
a bit of money. The country's currency was also created by the Jews (Fried-