were centrally located.
The annexed territories gave Russia some 800,000 Uniates, 100,000
Roman Catholics, and 50,000 Jews, of whom 300 resided in Velizh.15
In 1829, 90 percent of the 587,538 inhabitants in Vitebsk province lived
in the countryside. Of all the places officially classified as “urban settlements,” Velizh was the second largest, behind only the provincial capital
of Vitebsk (14,777 inhabitants), and ahead of Polotsk (6,722), Lepel’
(5,338), Dinaburg (4,646), Nevel’ (4,538), and Surazh (4,270). Those
decades witnessed a dramatic expansion of the Jewish population. By
1829, the Jews of Velizh comprised less than one- third of the population
(somewhere around 2,000 of 6,953 inhabitants).16
At the time of the criminal investigation, Velizh was divided along
economic, geographic, and confessional lines. Jews clustered on the
right bank of the Western Dvina, in the most prosperous part of
small-tOwn life
35
town, while the Belarusian population, comprising mainly Uniates
and a small number of Catholics, lived on the left bank, in the poor-
est section. The Uniate Church was Eastern Orthodox in rite and
Roman Catholic in doctrine. Merging Latin and Byzantine elements,
it served as the building block of peasant religious identity. The
mixed Uniate traditions were always in constant conflict with the
Eastern Orthodox Church. Parishioners celebrated holidays accord-
ing to the Julian calendar, the calendar of Orthodoxy, but learned
Catholic doctrine in the catechism. They prayed to Catholic saints,
while accepting the ceremonies and rites of the Orthodox Church.
After the first partition, Catherine started meddling in the reli-
gious life of the Uniate community. Following the Polish Uprising
of 1830– 1831, Nicholas I redoubled the empress’s efforts to transfer
Uniate churches, clergy, and parishes to the Orthodox Church. By
the mid- 1870s, the Russian government succeeded in thoroughly
suppressing the Uniate Church and forcibly converting all its mem-
bers to Russian Orthodoxy.17
In the mid- 1820s, the regime’s campaign to eradicate the Uniate
faith did little to alter the confessional landscape of the town. We
could imagine Velizh as consisting of three concentric zones: the mar-
ket square, surrounding neighborhoods, and suburbs.18 An 1837 topo-
graphical survey listed 997 buildings, of which fourteen were brick
structures; the rest were made of wood. The town hall— a two- story
brick building— was the most visible site in the market square. This
was where the municipal government, consisting of the town council,
treasury, and sheriff’s office, managed the town’s day- to- day affairs.
The post office, also a two- story brick building, stood on the eastern
edge of the square, as did the courthouse. Attracting people far and
wide, the market square was lined with rows of cloth stalls and shops
and was the town’s central gathering place. Among the many items
available for purchase on good days were chickens, geese, meats, an
assortment of vegetables and fruits, fresh fish, pickled herring, milk,
butter, and household items. Mirka Aronson’s two- story house— one
of three brick town homes owned by Jewish merchant families—
was on the left side of the town hall. Today the market square is a
small park, with a statue of Lenin prominently on display, and Mirka
36
Map of Velizh in the 1830s. Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi istoricheskii arkhiv, f. 1293, op. 166, d. 18
A Ruins of medieval castle
B Central marketplace
C Marketplace
D Marketplace
Brick structures
1. St. Nicholas Uniate Cathedral
2. St. Il’insk Uniate Church
3. Exaltation of the Holy Spirit Uniate Church
4. St. Trinity Uniate Church
5. Catholic church
6. Courthouse
7. Town hall
8. Post office
9. Treasury
10. General store
11. House belongs to St. Nicholas Cathedral, with trade shop on the first level and rooms for clergy on the second floor
Wooden structures
12. Old general store
13. Almshouse
14. Taverns
15. Flour mill
16. Tavern
17. Bridges
18. Primary school for Christian children
19. Two- story houses occupied by merchant families, with taverns
and trading stalls on the first level
20. Jewish school
21. Meat stalls
22. Trade stalls
23. Merchant warehouses and barns
24. Ferry
25. Town boundaries
26. St. Petersburg Road
27. Smolensk Road
28. Vitebsk Road
29. Toropets Road
30. Occupied homes
31. Unoccupied homes
33. Decrepit buildings
Sites outside town boundaries
33. St. Michael’s Cemetery
34. Feast of the Intercession Church
35. Vasilii the Great Church
36. Catholic cathedral
37. Fortress
38. Barn
38
38
the Velizh affair
A statue of Vladimir Lenin
in the center of the town
park, the site of the mar-
ketplace in the nineteenth
century. With the dissolu-
tion of the Soviet Union
in 1991, many cities and
towns destroyed the stat-
ues. Photograph by Jeffrey
Shallit
Aronson’s house has been converted into a museum of history and
local lore.
A visitor taking a stroll around town would see five Christian places
of worship— four Uniate and one Roman Catholic— all of which were
brick structures. The great synagogue, a two- story wooden building,
located just south of the town square, across the Holy Spirit Uniate
Church, played the most visible role in the religious and educational
life of the Jewish community.
But there were other religious institutions, not listed in the official
topographic surveys, that served important communal functions as well.
The kheyder, a private one- teacher elementary school, was the standard institution of Jewish learning. Teachers taught little boys sacred
Jewish texts in their own homes, beginning at age three. The physical
conditions— poor ventilation and easy transmission of disease— were
typically abysmal and the study hours exasperatingly long. The more
small-tOwn life
39
The Velizh Museum is now housed in the building where the Aronson/ Berlin
family lived in the 1820s. The structure was rebuilt after World War II. Photograph by the author
advanced students continued with studies of the Talmud in the bes-
medresh (communal study hall). With a large section reserved for men and a smaller one for women, the besmedresh served as a place of Torah learning and worship. The furnishings were simple, consisting of chairs
and tables, and most people came for several hours of part- time study
and prayer.19
Due to the significant presence of Hasidim, it is likely that there were
&n
bsp; several shtibls in town. The shtibl was not only a place for prayer and study, as was a synagogue or besmedresh, but also a social and recreational center akin to a club or pub patronized by only men. Most shtibls were modest in size— a hall, small building, or private home— and contemporaries
observed that, in addition to prayer and study, eating, singing, dancing,
storytelling, and overindulgences were commonplace. Jewish law for-
bade levity, idle talk, eating, drinking, and sleeping in a house of prayer.
Rabbinical authorities spilled much ink in denouncing the Hasidim for
engaging in these activities. For their part, authorities were not so much
troubled by the Hasidim straying outside the established boundaries of
prayer and study. What concerned them most was the merriment, loud
noise, and drunkenness that went on in shtibls at all hours of the night.20
Walking south on Il’inskaia Street, away from the marketplace,
visitors would pass by the Roman Catholic church, a wooden meat
40
40
the Velizh affair
stall, and a tavern. If they turned right, they would cross a small
wooden bridge and stumble upon the ruins of a medieval castle on
the embankment, probably built in the fourteenth century. If they
made a slight turn to the left, they would see a flour mill and brew-
ery. Only a few steps away was the general store, which occupied a
two- story brick building recently erected. Just north of the market
square on Il’inskaia Street was the St. Il’insk Uniate Church. A med-
ical clinic, another tavern, flour mill, and a small primary school
for Christian children were some of the other significant sites in the
neighborhood.
In Velizh, as in many other towns in the East European borderlands,
Jews owned almost all the homes and shops in the center, managed a siz-
able portion of the estates in the provincial district, enjoyed a monopoly
on the marketplace, and controlled timber sales, small- scale trade, and
the liquor industry.21 A complex of wooden homes, owned mostly by
Jews and a small number of humble Polish landowners, dotted the
eastern and western sides of the marketplace. These were one- story
structures, consisting of several rooms, with courtyards and gates. Most
Jews who lived there worked as tailors, cobblers, woodworkers, soap and
candlestick makers, and brush and comb makers. Some were bakers,
teachers, brewers, distillers, and glaziers. In the outlying areas, the small wooden homes were occupied by peasant families, lodgers, retired soldiers, vagrants, and itinerant laborers. Soldiers’ barracks, peasant huts,
and other modest wooden dwellings with dirt floors, tiny windows,
and damp walls could be found on the southern side of the town, on
either side of the Western Dvina. The jail stood next to the woods on
the outskirts of town along Smolensk Road. The Jewish cemetery was
located on the northern tip, around a thirty- minute walk from the town
center, and St. Michael’s Cemetery was on the south side, not too far
away from where the little boy Fedor was born.
Travelers took note of the miserable state of the land and the people
on the western side of the Russian border. Robert Johnson, for instance,
was taken aback at how quickly the “Russian character— the lively and
boisterous mirth of the poor Russ— changed for the cold, calculating
silence of the other.” Every feature— including the countenances, cos-
tume, and cut of hair— indicated a change of tribe. Jews were the princi-
pal inhabitants of the region. And he could not believe how many there
A postcard of Il’inskaia Street. The St. Il’insk Church, built in 1772 and demol-ished during World War II, is in the background. Velizh Museum
42
42
the Velizh affair
The great synagogue burned down in 1868. Male congregants sat around the spacious perimeter and on the sides of the bimah. Perezhitoe 3 (1911) were, “much more than might have been expected, so near the frontiers
of ancient Russia, a country in which a Jew has never attempted to
enter.” “The common Lithuanians”— a reference to local Uniates and
Catholics— “are poor, miserable, abject creatures,” while Jews “are lanky
and squalid,” all dressed alike “in long tunics of black silk, with a broad silken sash tied around the waist. On the head they wear a small velvet
cap, and over it a huge one made of fur.”22
Velizh county had the lowest population density in the province. It
also experienced some of the worst cases of famine, due in part to the
gritty nature of the sandy soil.23 In an assessment of the grain shortages
in Belarus, the poet- cum- statesman Gavriil Derzhavin observed, after a
personal tour of the region in 1799, that Vitebsk province was in much
worse shape than its neighbor Mogilev. With all the grain reserves used
up, the “entire northern region is suffering not only shortages, but
real- life hunger.”24 For Derzhavin, the source of the problem was the
unhealthy relations between petty Polish landowners, peasants, and
small-tOwn life
43
Jews. By allowing Jews to manage noble estates and encouraging harm-
ful pursuits such as the liquor trade, Polish landowners left peasants at
the mercy of the lease agents. Derzhavin spent the bulk of his lengthy
Opinion blaming Jews for the region’s economic woes.25
The war with Napoleon devastated the region. The Grand Armée
numbering half a million men crossed the Nemen River on June 24, 1812.
The French troops continued on to Vil’na (June 30), Vitebsk (July 28),
and Smolensk (August 18) before marching toward Moscow and back.
As the Russian army retreated, Cossacks were given the unenviable
task of burning entire villages and towns, bridges, and crossways and
destroying all the food and fodder they could grab. Local goods and pro-
duce were burned or carried away from neighborhood stores. Desertion
rates were unusually high.26 In his reflections on the ruins he witnessed,
Edward Morton noted, “All the ground was trodden by the conflict-
ing armies in the memorable campaign of 1812: upon these very plains
thousands and tens of thousands of the French invaders perished by
the sword and the rigour of the climate, in addition to their numerous
opponents who fel in the cause of their country.”27 Focusing on the
situation in Smolensk, Robert Johnson remarked, “Never did the hand
of destruction press more heavily than on this ill- fated city. Everything
bears the mark of French devastation.” After a sizable number of the
inhabitants fled for their lives, “nothing but a melancholy and horrid
picture of ruin is distinguishable.”28
For more than six months, soldiers fought over and plundered the
land, causing massive casualties and destruction of personal property.
Witnesses observed how fires blazed through neighborhoods and, on
occasion, wiped out entire urban settlements. The soldier Jakob Walter
reported that many of the towns “not only were completely stripped
[of provisions] but were also half- burned.”29 In the provincial capital
of Vitebsk, 2,415 residents (half of them Jews) died in the war and an
estimated 1.5 mi
llion rubles’ worth of property was destroyed (of which
67 percent belonged to Jews). Minsk county may have endured the
highest deaths, an estimated 55,500, but the numbers were not much
lower in the surrounding territories. Witnesses recalled that more than
15,000 corpses were buried under the ice in the Nemen River. Roughly
1,000 charred bodies were found in Snipishki and an additional 5,000
in Antokol’. In Grodno province, the death totals exceeded 4,000 and
4
44
the Velizh affair
the destruction of property was estimated at 29 million rubles, while its
neighbor Mogilev endured 33.5 million rubles’ worth of damage. The
same was true, to a lesser degree, for the counties of Vil’na, Kovno, and
Tel’shi.30
Velizh experienced the full brunt of the war, with 90 percent of all
homes heavily damaged by fires and looting, and it continued to deal
with the aftereffects for many years to come.31 The heavy loss of livestock and repeated crop failures during and after the war resulted in diminished food supplies. In the years 1821– 1822, a devastating famine swept
through the region, causing widespread population loss. One provincial
official reported that “many of the inhabitants [in Vitebsk province]
were crippled from hunger,” estimating that one hundred people died
of malnutrition and ninety- eight more were on the verge of death. The
loss of income due to lackluster agricultural production led to a sharp
decline in living standards and life expectancy.
The famine hit the peasantry particularly hard, although it trau-
matized everyone, including the townspeople and nobility. It was not
uncommon for people from all walks of life, dressed in tattered clothing,
to beg for handouts when they could not find anything to eat. The harsh
winter exacerbated the situation. In February 1822, at least forty- three
peasants succumbed to hunger while huddling together in an empty
provincial post office to escape from the cold. In a shelter for the home-
less in Vitebsk, three or four people died every night from hunger or
illness; the rest slept on dirt floors, where the air quality was particularly poor. As the province sank into despair from grain shortages, officials
resorted to desperate measures to contain the crisis from reaching epi-
demic proportions. To stop the spread of contagion and disease, the
The Velizh Affair Page 7