The Heavens Are Empty: Discovering the Lost Town of Trochenbrod (23 page)

Chaim Votchin, who shared stories of his partisan years.

In North and South America there was
:

Sol Ackman, who provided documents and information about the Baltimore–Washington, D.C., Trochenbrod community;

Michlean Amir, reference archivist at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, who offered valuable research guidance;

Laura Beeler, who provided Trochenbrod-related family photos;

Alexandra Belenkaya, who helped with Polish-to-English translation;

Marvin Bendavid, my brother, who accompanied me on my first trip to the site of Trochenbrod and has supported my research efforts ever since;

Naftali Bendavid, who helped with filming, interviewing, critiquing, and editorial advice;

Leah Bendavid-Val, who helped with photographing, interviewing, and critiquing, and who traveled with me in Ukraine. Leah also made major editorial contributions and has been a very supportive partner in this project and in the rest of my life;

Oren Bendavid-Val, who helped with filming, interviewing, critiquing, and advising, and who also traveled with me in Ukraine and Belarus;

Marlene Berman, who provided Trochenbrod-related family photos;

Doreen Berne, who provided information about David Shwartz and permission to incorporate his words;

Charles and Marilyn Bernhardt, who provided Trochenbrod-related family photos;

Miriam Antwarg Ciocler, who shared Trochenbrod-related family artifacts, photos, and photos of Trochenbrod artifacts;

Anne Weiner Cohen, who provided photos and information about the Baltimore–Washington, D.C., Trochenbrod organization;

Father Patrick Desbois, who, with authority and a depth of detail unavailable from any other source, explained how the
Einzatsgruppen
operated. (I talked with Father Desbois in the United States, but his headquarters are in Paris—see
http://yahadinunum.org
.)

Rose Blitzstein Elbaum, who provided an electronic version of the David Shwartz memoir;

Esther Safran Foer, who shared family stories and photos of Trochenbrod and the war years there, and who introduced me to Father Desbois;

Geri Wolfson Fuhrmann, who provided family print and oral Trochenbrod histories;

Mary Lou Garbin, who provided maps and research guidance on the Mennonites in the Trochenbrod area;

Betty Gold (Basia-Ruchel Potash), who shared her memories of Trochenbrod and the war period with me in great detail over an eleven-year period, and who helped to communicate with Ryszard Lubinski;

Jeremy Goldscheider, who was a partner in many filming and interviewing efforts;

Ronald Goldfarb, who encouraged my pursuit of publication of this book;

Phyllis Grossman, who provided Trochenbrod-related family photos;

Dr. Toby Helfand, who helped with Yiddish-to-English translation;

Betty Hellman (Peshia Gotman), who shared her memories of Trochenbrod;

Helmut T. Huebert, who provided research guidance and assistance, maps, and excerpts from the Mennonite Historical Atlas;

Ivan Katchanovski, who provided insights into events in the Trochenbrod area during World War II and help with Russian terms;

Chaim Kimelblat, who provided information about Jewish resettlement in South America;

Merrill Leffler, who gave invaluable advice and guidance for improving the manuscript for this book;

Alyn Levin-Hadar, who shared Trochenbrod family history and photos;

Andrea Liss, who facilitated communication with her grandmother, Ida Liss, a native of Trochenbrod;

Ida Gilden Liss, who shared her memories of growing up in Trochenbrod;

George L. Maser, whose prewar map of the Trochenbrod region helped spur me to further research;

Israel Milner, who provided information about the Philadelphia Trochenbrod-Lozisht organization;

Laura Praglin, who provided family print and oral Trochenbrod histories;

Szoel Rojtenberg, who shared his memories of Trochenbrod;

Burt and Ellen Singerman, who provided Trochenbrod-related family photos;

Olya Smolyanova, who helped with Russian-to-English and Ukrainian-to-English translation;

Gary Sokolow, who shared Trochenbrod-related photographic and print material;

Sam Steinberg, who helped with Yiddish-to-English translation;

Anne Weiner, who provided Trochenbrod-related family photos;

Olga Zachary, who helped with Ukrainian-to-English translation;

Agnieszka Zieminska, who helped with Polish-to-English translation; and

Eliana Zuckermann, who hosted me and coordinated interviews in Rio de Janeiro.

In Ukraine, Russia, and Poland there was
:

Mikhailo Demchuk, who shared his memories of Trochenbrod and the war years;

Ustyma Denysivna, Ljubov Ivanivna, and Sofia Panasivna, who as a group in Horodiche shared their memories of Trochenbrod;

Alexander Dunai, who for ten years was my devoted driver, translator, researcher, guide, friend, and fellow adventurer in Ukraine—I could not have managed without him in that period;

Anatoliy Hrytsiuk, head of the Volyn Regional Council, and staff for their hospitality and their administrative and logistical support during field activities;

Ivan Kovalchuk, who shared his memories of Trochenbrod and the war years;

Anna, Eva, and Ivan Kurnyev, warm and generous Lutsk friends, who helped with field research, photography, research facilitation, and local communication in Ukraine;

Ryszard Lubinski, who with great generosity, openness, and warmth shared his memories and photos of Trochenbrod during lengthy interview sessions in Radom, Poland;

Panas Mudrak, who shared his memories of Trochenbrod and the war years;

Loiko Mykytivna (Eva Kurnyeva’s mother), who shared her memories of Trochenbrod and the war years;

Vladislav Nakonieczny, who shared his memories and thoughts about Ukraine in the war years, the Communist era, and the early post-Communist era;

Vira Shuliak, who shared her memories of Trochenbrod and the war years;

Sergiy Omelchuk, a native of Lutsk, who helped with field research, photography, local communication, transportation, and logistical arrangements, who provided local representation for this project in the Lutsk-Trochenbrod area and has been a dear, reliable, and trusted friend since 2006;

Ivan and Nina Podziubanchuk, who together with their children Maria and Bogdan (most recently joined by new arrival Illya) have been taking me by tractor-wagon to the site of Trochenbrod, arranging interviews with old-timers in the villages of Domashiv and Yaromel, showing me villages and special places in the Trochenbrod region, connecting me with local officials, acquiring Trochenbrod artifacts and giving them to me as gifts, feeding me scrumptious rural Ukrainian meals topped off with homemade vodka, and generally being great friends for well over a decade;

Yale J. Reisner, who, from his position as Director of Research and Archives at the Ronald S. Lauder Foundation Genealogy Project at the Jewish Historical Institute of Poland, in Warsaw, generously provided me with my first Trochenbrod documents, documents that helped fire my imagination and interest;

Nikolai Romanov, who helped with Russian-to-English translation;

Meylakh Sheykhet, who in Lviv helped me understand Jewish prewar and wartime life in eastern Poland, now Ukraine, and the present-day complexities of trying to recapture elements of it;

Evgenia Shvardovskaya, who at the site of Trochenbrod, in Israel, and in Lutsk shared her memories of Trochenbrod; and

Yankel Szyc, who on my repeated visits to Poland served as my driver, guide, and translator.

TOP:
Trochenbrod today, looking south.
BOTTOM:
Spot near the site of Trochenbrod where tractors and horse carts ford the creek even today. This could be Trochim Ford, but there is no way to know for certain.
Photos by the author
.

OPPOSITE TOP:
A field near the site of Trochenbrod today. The reeds mark a creek. Though the area is now drained, this photo hints of what the first settlers at Trochim Ford found at the site.
Photo by the author
.
OPPOSITE BOTTOM:
Segment of a map of Mennonite settlements in western Ukraine in the 1800s, from the Mennonite Historical Atlas, 1996. The original Mennonite village of Sofiyovka (Zofijowka) on the Horyn River is in the upper right corner. The newer settlements of Yosefin (Jozefin) and Sofiyovka (Zofjowka) are to the southwest, between the Horyn and Styr Rivers, northeast of Lutsk (Luck). Map provided by Helmut T. Huebert, principal author of the Mennonite Historical Atlas.
ABOVE:
Russian map, 1890. Trochenbrod’s name is given only as “Zufiyuvka.” The town, with its distinctive one long street and larger size than other settlements in the area, is prominent in the southeast quadrant of the map. Its sister village to the northwest, “Kol. Ignatuvka” has the additional name “Lozhishe” under it, though it was actually known as “Lozisht.” In the southwest quadrant is “Kol. Yuzefin,” originally established by Mennonites and later peopled by “Volksdeutch.”