pdf available - Multiple Choices

AS REFUGEES IN LUBOML
By Rochl Meltzer
When the Hitler Holocaust broke out we lived in
Chelm. My dear parents, Menachem-Mendl son
of Moyshe Feldmus and Chaye daughter of Tsvi
Rayf, tried their best to send us away to Libivne,
which was then occupied by the Soviets.
We left Chelm for Libivne together with some
children of the town. We came to our dear grandmother,
Sheyndl bas Yisroel Baruch, and to our
aunt, Feyge.
Here we began our life as refugees. Libivne
was flooded with refugees; people were packed
into the synagogues and life was growing
harsher day by day. Many of the Jewish refugees
were caught and deported to Siberia. This
was the ugly deception of the NKVD. They said:
"He who wishes to return to his home may do
so by registering." The refugees were unaware
that registering to go back to their homes, that
is, to Chelm, meant to be sent into the hands of
Nazi savages. As it turned out they were deported
deep into Siberia.
In Libivne we lived with my aunt Chasye and
Tratl Pomerants (z"1). They too had fulfilled the
mitzvah [good deed] of giving a home to refugees
by taking in me and my husband Yosef. But soon
the well-known Ukrainian Communist of Luboml,
Rizinki Styupo, came to us with a letter, requisitioning
half the apartment. Still later, the
nachalnik [commander] Lyova Gelfun was sent
in to live there too (he was a Jew from Berdichev).
The house became so overcrowded that we went
237
back to live with Aunt Feyge.
The Soviet authorities made sure to get as
many refugees as they could and sent them into
the depths of Russia to work for the Soviets. They
promised the refugees all kinds of privileges, for
they could not depend on the refugees to go there
voluntarily; and so the Soviet officials came to
"visit" them and took them away to work in
Russia.
We saw under what conditions Polish refugees
were sent to Russia: They were shipped in
freight cars, without any sanitary facilities, without
food or water, and so we tried to get out of this
somehow. For this reason we had to change our
place of residence quite often, wandering to
Kovel, Masheve, and back to Luboml.
But it was no use. On a certain night, the
Soviet militia caught us and several other refugees,
and we too were sent to Asiatic Russia,
where we spent the rest of the war years. The
hardships we lived through there are a matter
for another chapter.
After the war, we went back to live in Poland,
but we stayed there only a short time. It was
impossible to live in a place where at every step
we came across evidence of the great Jewish
devastation and the dreadful end of those who
were near and dear to us.
After a long interval of wanderings, I, my
husband Yosef, and our son Moyshe finally arrived
in Eretz Yisroel.