by Anna Bikont
7. After the Soviets left in June 1941 and peasants from the surrounding villages met in Jasionówka to loot Jewish homes, the same Father Łozowski “shouted and lectured at people and didn’t allow them to do it” and also “threatened them with Hell if they went on doing such an injustice,” as described after the war by the survivor Pesia Szuster-Rozenblum. He was probably a supporter of the economic boycott, which was supposed to force Jews out of Poland, but didn’t support violence and looting. However, he wasn’t able to prevent the pogrom.
8. The Jedwabne parish chronicle notes in 1937: “From the time when regent Romuald Rogowski, in collaboration with Mayor Walenty Grądzki, hired firemen for twenty zlotys to ring the bell all day for the funeral of Marshal Piłsudski against the parish priest’s will, which was condemned by the whole parish population, the church authorities have issued an interdiction against the Jedwabne fire brigade, banning it from participating in church celebrations.” In the parish chronicle of nearby Łapy we read: “The year 1938 is a period of the greatest development ever of the Catholic spirit in Łapy. It is a period of full bloom for Catholic Action. True, the godless Union of Rail Workers, with its close ties to the Polish Socialist Party, going hand in hand with Jews, is still active, but the range of their activity is shrinking more and more.”
9. Parties and associations that had branches or affiliates in the towns and villages of the Łomża area included Zionist parties of various stripes: General Zionists, Poale Zion-Right, the religious Mizrachi, the Revisionist Zionists, the socialist Bund; educational, cultural, and sports associations: the Zionist Tarbut, the Association of Evening Classes, the Education Association, the Jewish Association for Athletics and Sports Makabi, the Bundist League of Cultures; youth organizations: the leftist Zionist scouting organization Ha-Szomer ha-Cair, He-Chaluc, which prepared young people for life in Palestine, and Brit Trumpeldor, a revisionist Zionist youth organization; mutual-aid organizations: Jewish Guilds of Butchers, the Central Union of Jewish Artisans, Gemilut Chesed, a savings and loan bank, the Jewish Shareholders Bank, the Jewish Cooperative Bank of Real Estate Owners, Keren Kajemet, or the Jewish National Fund, which collected funds for the purchase of land in Palestine, the League of Aid for Workers in Palestine, and others.
10. An Interior Ministry official has preserved for us an image of these conflicts. On the occasion of a visit to Białystok on July 2, 1933, by Włodzimierz Jabotyński, an advocate of the armed struggle for a Jewish state in Palestine, two thousand supporters of the Revisionist Zionist Party gathered, and when they set off to the synagogue carrying banners, a group of Bundists and the right-wing Poale Zion-Right members threw rotten eggs at them. Jabotyński also came to lecture in Łomża, where Jews from Jedwabne and Radziłów probably had a chance to hear him. He was very popular in the area. Szmul Wasersztejn describes in his diary that when he got to the police station in Jedwabne on July 10, 1941, the Germans interrogated him about whether he or his father belonged to Jabotyński’s organization and whether it had helped him hide during the pogrom.
11. In Radziłów, 1932 saw the peak of Polish Communist Party activity. Here are its activities: In March, a banner was hung out—Down with the bloody Fascist dictatorship, long live the Polish Republic of councils, long live the Polish Communist Party. In April, Chona Zeligson and Zajdel Rozenbaum were picked up while distributing Communist appeals. During a church fair in July, Chona Moruszewski and Zajdel Rozenbaum let loose in a crowd two pigeons painted red, with antistate slogans on ribbons. In September, Abram Moszek Bursztyn delivered sixty-six Communist appeals to a confidant for distribution, and a hundred appeals to “Comrade peasants” were scattered in a pasture. It is hard to know how many Communist Party members there were in Radziłów itself; the existing data relate to the whole district committee, which covered various areas, sometimes including Grajewo, sometimes Szczuczyn as well, and mention is made of dozens of people. After: Józef Kowalczyk, The Polish Communist Party in the Łomża District, 1919–1938, Warsaw: PWN, 1978.
2. I Wanted to Save Her Life—Love Came Later: or, The Story of Rachela Finkelsztejn and Stanisław Ramotowski
1. NSZ: Narodowe Siły Zbrojne, or National Armed Forces, a Polish underground armed formation at odds with the Polish Home Army over what the National Armed Forces considered the excessively conciliatory stance of the Home Army toward the Soviet Union and Red Army; the National Armed Forces, which were blatantly anti-Semitic, took the view that the Nazis were a lesser threat than the Soviets, and they continued anti-Soviet partisan operations after the war ended.
3. We Suffered Under the Soviets, the Germans, and People’s Poland: or, The Story of the Three Brothers Laudański
1. Osadnik (Polish; settler, colonist) was the word used in the Soviet Union for a veteran of the Polish Army given land in the Kresy, or Borderland territories (current western Belarus and western Ukraine), ceded to Poland by the Polish-Soviet Riga Peace Treaty of 1921 (and occupied by the Soviet Union in 1939).
2. “An especially large number of Russians came to Jedwabne. It was the headquarters of the Regional Committee of the Communist Party of Belorussia, the Regional Executive Committee of Delegates of the Working People, the Regional Department of the NKVD, and others. All the highest positions were occupied by new arrivals (per Michał Gnatowski, “Dokumenty radzieckie o postawach ludności i polskim podziemiu niepodległościowym w rejonie jedwabieńskim w latach 1939–1941” [Soviet documents on popular attitudes and the underground Polish independence movement in the Jedwabne region in 1939–1941], in Wokół Jedwabnego [About Jedwabne], vol. 2, eds. Paweł Machcewicz and Krzysztof Persak, Warsaw: Institute of National Remembrance, 2002).
3. Mark Timofiejewicz Rydaczenko, secretary of the Regional Committee of the Communist Party of Belorussia in Jedwabne, writing on June 19, 1940, to his counterpart in Białystok, described “the attempts of hostile elements to penetrate trade and cooperative institutions to raise prices and sell products to speculators, arousing the discontent of the working masses.” Many Jews were jailed or deported on such charges. The fact itself that Jews were employed in shops they used to own made them suspect individuals. From Informacje o sytuacji polityczno-ekonomicznej w rejonie jedwabieńskim (Information on the political-economic situation in the Jedwabne region), September 16, 1940: “Labor collectives, points of sale, regional cooperatives of grocers and groceries are inundated with former tradesmen and speculators—for example the salesman Hersz Dembowicz used to be a speculative tradesman, the saleswoman Dwojra Kon used to own a glove shop, Chilewska Chana used to be a speculator…” (in Michał Gnatowski, Niepokorna Białostocczyzna. Opór społeczny i polskie podziemie niepodległościowe w regionie białostockim w latach 1939–1941 w radzieckich źródłach [Insubordinate Białystok: Popular resistance and the underground Polish independence movement in the Białystok region, 1939–1941, in Soviet sources], Białystok: Białystok University, 2001).
6. If I’d Been in Jedwabne Then: or, The Story of Meir Ronen, Exiled to Kazakhstan
1. The British government ran internment camps on Cyprus from August 1946 to January 1949 for Jews attempting to immigrate to Mandatory Palestine in violation of British policy.
8. Your Only Chance Was to Pass for a Goy: or, The Survival of Awigdor Kochaw
1. From Complete Poetic Works of Hayyim Nahman Bialik. Israel Efros, ed. New York, 1948.
12. They Had Vodka, Guns, and Hatred: or, July 7, 1941, in Radziłów
1. Members of the gangs that went by Jewish homes from June 23 to July 7, beating and robbing, were: the brothers Jan and Henryk Dziekoński; the brothers Aleksander, Feliks, and Stanisław Godlewski; the brothers Leon and Antoni Kosmaczewski; Ludwik Kosmaczewski, Paulin’s son (so called to distinguish him from another Ludwik Kosmaczewski); Jan Kowalewski; Stanisław Leszczewski; Zygmunt Mazurek; Bronisław and Leszek Michałowski; the brothers Jan, Antoni, and Feliks Mordasiewicz; Aleksander Nitkiewicz; Józef
Paszkowski; Wincenty Piotrowski; Aleksander Polkowski; the brothers Andrzej, Ignacy, and Józef Ramotowski; Zygmunt Skrodzki; Mieczysław Strzelecki and his sister Eugenia; and Józef Sulewski, a.k.a. Nieczykowski.
2. The parish record book has an entry saying that Jan Ekstowicz, thirty-five years of age, a farmer from Radziłów, came at 8:00 a.m. on July 30, 1941, and two ten-year-olds were baptized: Jan Gryngras, son of Szmul and Rejza Bursztyn, and Stanisław Wierzba, son of Szymek and Ryfka (Herszek’s daughter).
Acknowledgments
I thank the heroes of my book, who agreed to return to their darkest memories.
I thank all those who helped me, by taking me in as I wandered in search of witnesses and documents, by reading my manuscript, and simply by offering support at the difficult time in my life when I was working on this book.
Special thanks are due to Joanna Szczęsna, who edited the book at each successive stage of its composition.
I would also like to mention my friends in America. I didn’t take it very well when well-meaning acquaintances (and less well-meaning strangers) discouraged me from writing a book on the crime in Jedwabne, and that is why the first version was written in cafés in Manhattan, and—thanks to the benevolence of Lawrence Weschler—in a guest room at the New York Institute for the Humanities at NYU and in the office of Professor Marta Petrusewicz at CUNY. During that time I was hosted by Ann Snitow and Daniel Goode, Joanna and Lawrence Weschler, Anna Husarska, Sławomir Grunberg, Irena Grudzińska-Gross, and Ewa Zadrzyńska.
I will cherish in grateful memory the creator of the website www.radzilow.com, Jose Gutstein of Miami, who agreed to the publication of prewar photographs of the people of Radziłów, and also the late Rabbi Jacob Baker of Brooklyn, who gave his consent for the publication of photographs and maps of prewar Jedwabne.
I lack words to thank my American translator, Alissa Valles, for her brilliant work. I also express my gratitude and admiration for my editor at Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Ileene Smith. I’m deeply honored by the amount of time, heart, and skill Alissa and Ileene invested in my book. Working with FSG, in every department I dealt with, was a happy adventure all the way. I remain in grateful debt to all of these people.
Index
The index that appears in the print version of this title does not match the pages in your e-book. Please use the search function on your e-reading device to search for terms of interest. For your reference, the terms that appear in the print index are listed below.
About Jedwabne (Machcewicz and Persak, eds.)
Adamczykowa, Henryka
Adenauer, Konrad
Agricultural Chaplaincy
Agudat Israel
Alenberg, Chawa
All Saints Church, Warsaw
America, Jews’ emigration to; Chicago, Ill.; New York, N.Y.
American Polish Congress
Anaf, Monio (Mosze)
Antyk
Arnold, Agnieszka
Association of Young Catholic Men and Women
Atlas, Morris (Mosze Atłasowicz)
Atłasowicz, Aunt (aunt of Jack Kubran)
Atłasowicz, Judes
Atłasowicz, Małka
Atłasowicz, Szolem
Auschwitz
Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum
Axer, Erwin
Axer, Otto
Axer, Paul
Baczyński, Krzysztof Kamil
Bagińska, Elżbieta
Bagińska, Sylvia
Bagiński, Czesio
Bagiński, Henryk
Baker, Herschel
Baker, Jacob (Jakub Piekarz); Dziedzic and; Jedwabne Book of Memory, see Jedwabne Book of Memory
Baker, Julius; Jedwabne Book of Memory, see Jedwabne Book of Memory
Bardoń, Karol; testimony of
Bargłowski, Aleksandr
Bartnik, Czesław
Batista, Fulgencio
Begin, Menachem
Belbud, Chana
Belorussia
Ben-Gurion, David
Ber, Wolf
Bernard, Jehoszua
Bialik, Chaim Nachman
Białobrzeski, Mrs.
Białostocki, Awigdor
Białoszewski, Mojsze
Białystok; Institute of National Remembrance in; Interior Ministry in
Bibiński, Stach
Bible
Biedrzycka, Janina
Biedrzycki, Henryk
Bielecki, Władysław
Bikont, Maniucha
Bikont, Ola
Bikont, Piotr
Binsztejn, Basia
Binsztejn, Szajn
Birkner, Wolfgang
blackmail
Black Years in the Łomża Lands (Smurzyński)
Błaszczak, Leokadia
Błoński, Jan
Blumert, Auhhter
Blumert, Jankiel
Boczkowski, Stefan
Bond, see Więz
books of memory; see also Jedwabne Book of Memory
Borawski, Edward
Borensztajn, Icek
Borowski, Mieczysław
Borowski, Wacław
Bosakowski, Ryszard
Brandys, Marian
Bricha
Bronowiczowa, Danuta
Bronowiczowa, Jadwiga
Browning, Christopher
Bubel, Leszek
Bukowski, Józef
Bundists
Burgrafowa, Józefa
Bursztyn, Abram Moszek
Bursztyn, Igal
Bursztyn, Rejza
Bursztyn, Ruta
Bursztyn, Szmul
Buzek, Jerzy
C., Czesław
Cała, Alina
Camp for a Greater Poland (CGP)
Camp for a Greater Poland Youth
Castro, Fidel
Catherine the Great
Catholic Action
Catholic Cause, The, see Sprawa Katolicka
Catholic Church, Catholics
Catholic House
Catholic Information Agency
Catholic News Agency Bulletin
Catholic University
census
CENTOS
Chicago, Ill., Polish community in
Chojnowska, Łucja
Choromański, Józef
Chower, Józef
Christians; see also Catholic Church, Catholics
Chrostowski, Jan
Chrostowski, Waldemar
Chrzanowska, Helena; death of brother Icek
Chrzanowska, Irena
Chrzanowski, Józef
Chrzanowski, Wiesław
Chrząstowska, Maria
Church of St. Brigid
CIA
Ciszewski, Bolesław
Committee in Defense of the Workers (KOR)
Committee to Defend the Good Name of Jedwabne
Committee to Defend the Honor and Dignity of the Polish Nation
Common Cause
Communism, Communists; Komsomol; Operation Peter Pan and
concentration camps; Auschwitz; Treblinka
Contacts, see Tygodnik Kontakty
Costa Rica
Council of Christians and Jews
Cuba
Culture
Cynowicz, Hersz
Cynowicz, Josle
Cyprus
Cyra, Adam
Cytrynowicz, Jakub
Cytrynowicz, Jan
Cytrynowicz, Józef (Jósek)
Cytrynowicz, Pelagia
Cytrynowicz, Sara
Czajkowski, Michał
Czapnicki, Awigdor
Czapnicki, Chaim
Czarzasta, Halina
Czerwińska, Kasia
Czerwiński, Lejbko
Czerwoniak
Dąbrowska, Jadwiga
Dąbrowski, Władysław
Danowski, Stanisław
Darkness at Noon (Koestler)
Datner, Szymon; A Forest of Righteous Men; “The Holocaust in Radziłow”
Datner-Śpiewak
, Helena
deportations; first wave of; last wave of; second and third waves of
Depression, Great
Destruction of the Jewish Population in the Białystok Region, The
Diary of the Occupation (Klukowski)
Disneyland
Długosiodła
Dmitrów, Edmund
Dmoch, Leokadia
Dmowski, Roman
Dobkowski, Bolesław
Dobkowski, Tadeusz
Dobkowski, Wincenty
Dobkowski, Witek
Dobkowski family
Dobroński, Adam
Dołęgowski, Aleksander
Domitrz, Apolinary
Domiziak, Aleksander
Dorogoj, Akiwa (Icek)
Dorogoj, Bencyjon
Dorogoj, Dora (Szyma)
Dorogoj, Fruma
Dorogoj, Mosze (Mordechaj)
Dorogoj, Szejna
Drejarski, Fajba
Drozdowo
Drozdowski, Aleksander
Drozdowski, Dominik
Drozdowski, Olek
Dubin, Wiśka
Dudziński, Władysław
Dusze
Dworzysko
Dymnicki, Izrael Meir
Dziedzic, Ewa
Dziedzic, Leon
Dziedzic, Leszek; Baker and
Dziedzic, Piotrek
Dziedzic, Tomek
Dziedzic family
Dziekoński, Henryk
Dziekoński, Jan
Dziennik Bałtycki (Baltic Daily)
Edelman, Aleksander
Edelman, Ania
Edelman, Marek
Ekstowicz, Franciszek
Ekstowicz, Jan
Ekstowicz, Józef, see Klimaszewski, Józef
Ełk
Ellis Island
Episcopal Convention
Eucharist
Farberowicz, Raszka
Farbowicz, Motłe
Finkelsztejn, Chaja