So my mother disobeyed her uncle as she had once disobeyed her father and went to another town with Yitzchak where another uncle, a rabbi, married them. The town was likely to have been Bransk, which is where Yitzchak’s mother, Dvora, my grandmother, was born.
Yitzchak’s own parents were horrified. Their son, from a wealthy and illustrious family such as theirs, had married a girl for love. Not only that, but a lowly farmer’s daughter estranged from her own family with no dowry and certainly no evident good name, and the yichus it should bring.
6
My father, Yitzchak (or Izaak) Lewin, was born on 21 September 1900, so he was six years older than my mother. He was born in either Bielsk or Bransk where his mother was born. His parents were Moshe and Dvora Lewin. Moshe was born in 1875 and Dvora in 1880. Dvora was the daughter of Tzvi and Sara Kotlovitch.
My father Yitzchak and his sister Rose Lewin c. 1903-04
Moshe and Dvora Lewin
My father was the eldest of six children, a year older than his sister Rose and nine years older than his brother David. Then there were twin sisters, Sarah and Gitl, and the youngest was Shmuel, or as he was called, ‘Munni’. Shmuel was twenty-three years younger than my father.
The 1928 business directory listed four Lewins, all in the grocery business (spozywcze artykuly). F. Lewin was on Koscielna Street, L. Lewin on Mickiewicza Street, and W. Lewin on Rustowszowy Place, while my grandfather, Moshe Lewin, also had his business in Mickiewicza Street. While this is the longest street in Bielsk Podlaski, cutting through the town, it seems mostly residential, with the shops congregated in the area of Mickiewicza Square.
The Lewins were primarily in the grocery business in Bielsk Podlaski with only one, an A. Lewin, being listed in the directory as selling obuwie (shoes) on Sienkiawicza Street. Whether these were the sons of Moshe or brothers I don’t know, but it seemed Lewin was a big name in grocery, until I realised there were over sixty grocery stores in Bielsk Podlaski. The number of stores reflected the diversity of what they sold, for they were not supermarkets but had their own specialties: one for herrings, another for pickles, one for flour or sugar and so on. The addresses of nearly all these businesses were in one block of what must have been a thriving and vibrant central shopping district.
The stores themselves were often in single- or two-storey brick buildings with glazed doorways and ground-floor windows. Many were rendered in classic styles. It was quite an elegant town with wide paved tree-lined footpaths proudly displaying towering electricity poles carrying many layers of crossbeams and wires, areas of parkland, and its own railway station, rebuilt after being bombed in the First World War. The imposing main church across the square from the Lewin’s grocery was similarly white rendered, tall and two storeys high with a high red-tiled roof and a clock tower. Over half the non-Jews were Russian Orthodox in practice and most of the churches had Russian-style domes.
Could my father have first seen my mother as she was going to and from the haberdashery store in the same street and decided to introduce himself by buying a button? It does seem possible.
When they married it was to the horror of the Lewin family that their son could have married for love. Ostracised after their marriage, Gitel and my father stayed in Bransk, where it is likely my sister was born.
In 1929, after the birth of my sister, Chaya, in Bransk, my grandmother Dvora decided it was time to make contact and ask her son and his family to return to Bielsk Podlaski. After all, this was her grandchild.
My mother refused unless Dvora overcame her pride and personally came to collect them, which she did. So, it transpired my parents and sister returned from Bransk to Bielsk Podlaski, a distance of 25 kilometres, by horse and cart. To my mother this was as good as an apology. Strangely, from then on, she and Dvora got on very well.
Yitzchak and Gitel Lewin’s home and petrol pump
My parents moved into a large house in front of an extensive orchard and my mother began to help in my father’s business. It is likely the house and business were purchased by my grandparents and may have been a factor in the reconciliation. My father had a fuel distribution centre with an exclusive contract to supply fuel to the Polish Army in the area. His was the only depot in the district; it had a tall petrol pump out front, which I still remember. It was just a few doors from my grandparents’ grocery store. It wasn’t long before my mother ran the place and served the customers. My father stayed out of sight, as the soldiers didn’t take kindly to being served by a Jew. Being served by a woman probably amused them. His father Moshe similarly was never seen in his grocery store as the anti-Semitism of the town would not tolerate non-Jewish customers being served by a Jew. Instead, like Yitzchak, he stayed in the room behind the store studying his texts.
My mother with me, 1934
I was born in 1934, yet have only brief early memories of my father and my time in Bielsk Podlaski in Poland. I am told my father was a quiet, unassuming man. My most distinct memory is of sitting on his shoulders going to shul (synagogue) on Shabbat (Saturday). Of my paternal grandparents I also remember little. Their general store was only a few doors away. There they sold loose sugar, salt and pickles. I still have memories of eating those pickles straight from the barrel.
While in Bielsk Podlaski, the rabbi would come to teach Chaya Jewish studies and Tanach, for she would have been ten when I was five and already a schoolgirl. I remember sitting under the table tickling her feet and being the annoying younger brother. Chaya would play with the older children, as I was of little interest to her. She knew it was no use complaining to mum about my annoying behaviour, for as she used to later say, ‘In Mum’s eyes there was G-d, and then there was you.’ Even back then I could do no wrong in my mother’s eyes.
Of the town I remember little, but I know we were not allowed out of the house on Sundays because the priest’s church services were viciously anti-Semitic. The main church was directly opposite my grandparents’ and my father’s shop, and we would have to pull down our shutters during the service, otherwise the shops might have been the first targets for the fired-up hooligans leaving church. There was open anti-Semitism in the morning, but then the shutters were lifted and business took place as usual in the afternoon when the Poles returned carrying produce to the market to sell to the Jews.
One of the churches on Mickiewicza Street where we had our home and business
As I write this I realise I don’t have a lot to tell you of those years of my early childhood. As I search my sack of stones for those memories I excuse myself, for it was nearly eighty years ago, and who can remember back so far? But yet, that isn’t how memories work, for there are those painful moments I have revisited so often they could have occurred yesterday. My early childhood years in Poland were happy times but lacking specifics, because happiness may well simply mean being content and safe and living a normal life. I cannot recall my bedroom, my toys or any children I played with. Where were my uncles and aunts and cousins whom I would have seen so frequently? Where are their smiles and laughter, hugs and kisses, treats and gifts, and love? Why don’t I recall our Shabbat table? Yet in my heart, all of these existed.
I believe I have failed to recall the details of my early years because my happiness was then crushed by the overwhelming load I carried during the following years. A blissful childhood, a loving family … such memories are unable to compete with those linked with terror and pain. Stones reduced to gravel, to be washed away by time.
7
The