.
THE JEWISH NEWS
Page Twelve
Chicagoans Trace Kin in Europe
Frederick C. White (left) executive director of the Chicago
division of the American Jewish Congress, and Rabbi Asher T.
Katz, director of the Midwest region, right, assisting Chicagoans
in tracing refugee relatives in liberated European countries. - The
AJC Bureau is virtually an "international bureau of missing per-
sons," 300 Chicagoans already having located their relatives through
lists supplied by the Jewish Community Council of Moscow.
10,000 Jews Slain by Nazis
Before Retreat in Kaunas
Stalin Pro-Zion
Stand Reported
As Exaggerated
smuggled into the ghetto.
The same dispatch confirms
earlier reports that several thou-
sand Jews were killed in Vilna a
few days before the Germans fled
the city. These Jews, who were
confined in a ghetto, were the
remnants of the more than 50,000
Jews who had resided in Vilna
and the many thousands who
were brought there from western
Europe.
(Arnold Levin comments on
the reported pro-Zionist stand of
Josef Stalin in his column,
"Heard in the Lobbies," on Page
2 of this issue of -The Jewish
News).
Jews Leave Forests
To Return to Cities
MOSCOW (JTA)—Jewish par-
tisans from the cities of Minsk,
Pinsk, Bialystok, Baranovichi,
Slonim and other liberated Bye-
lorussian cities and towns are re-
turning from the forestsito begin
rebuilding their homes and fac-
tories which were destroyed by
the Germans, according to dis-
patches reaching here.
They are almost the only sur-
vivors of the hundreds ; of thou-
sands of Jews who resided in
Byelorussia before the Nazi in-
vasion. They reveal that Pinsk
and ,Slonim were converted into
execution centers for Jews. Pinsk
was the headquarters of an Elite
Guards captain named Zaver who
later cammanded the Treblinka
death camp.
Hundreds Returning
. Although virtually' no Jews
were found in. Vilna and the sur-
rounding townships when the
Red Army first entered the re-
gion, hundreds of Jews are bt-
ginning to return from the for-
ests in which-they hid to escape
destruction by the Germans.
These are mainly young able-
bodied persons who fled to the
woods and joined partisan bands.
More than 1,00Q • persons al-
ready have returned to Glubo-
kaye in the Vilna district and
reports- here express the hope
that there may be others still
in the forests. Most of the Jews
of Glabkoye were massacred in
1941.
In Vilna proper, the new head
of the municipal economy depart-
ment is a Jewish youth named
Simonovich who led 300 Jewish
partisans named "The Avengers."
The ranks of the "Avengers" were
filled with Jews who had escaped
from the ghetto. In addition to
the "Avengers" there were two
other Jewish guerilla bands op-
erating around Vilna.
1,000 Hide in Forest
The story of how 1,000 fugitive
Jews dwelt for two years in a
well-established forest commun-
ity in the Baranovichi district of
Byelorussia, in the heart of Ger-
man-held territory, was told this
week by Henach Levin, a 13 - year-
Poles Assure
Jewish. Rights
4
old Jewish partisan.
The residents of the settlement
had fled from ghettos, labor
camps, and concentration camps
in the cities of Mir, Rakov, Slo-
nim, Baranovichi and the sur-
ropnding hamlets.
The forest community, which
was under the protection of
neighboring partisan bands, pro-
vided the guerillas with shoes,
caps, clothes and other articles
which were manufactured in
shops established by the refugees.
Eight Jewish boys from Minsk,
ranging in age from 11 to 15,
returned to that city this week
after spending nine months with
a partisan band in the neigh-
oring forests.
The boys fled the ghetto about
a year ago after they had seen
their parents and friends massa-
cred. !
. The thing that hit the boys the
hardest, the correspondent writes,
was the necessity to part with
their rifles and swords before en-
tering the children's home in
which they are now being cared
for.
Jewish Women Slay
Hundreds of Nazis
NEW YORK (JPS) — Wilno
Jews who in 1941 meekly allowed
the conquering Germans to herd
them into a ghetto, are in 1944 an
avenging band of guerillas 300
strong, each one of whom has
killed at least one German, and
some boasting the scalps - of doz-
ens of Nazis, in a three year cam-
paign to even the score with the
executioners of Wilno's 80,000
Jews. This is reported by Daniel
De Luce, New York Herald
Tribune correspondent in Mos-
cow, quoting V. Mikhailov of the
Moscow News.
"Young Jewesses with tommy
guns slung over their shoulders
and grenades dangling from their
belts," who marched through the
streets of liberated Wilno, are
part of a partisan band of Wilno
Jews who carried on the war
from forest hideouts near the old
Lithuanian capital. One Jewish
girl said: "I've killed only six
GerMans, but there are Jews in
our detachment who have killed
dozens."
Most 1 Jewish partisans were
students or factory apprentices
before the war. , Their chief of
staff was Shlema Brandt, a for-
mer furniture maker. Chief tar-
get of the Jewish guerillas was
the Wilno-Lida railway line along
which 58 locomotives were re-
ported smashed and stations and
tracks damaged.
Markers With Mogen Dovid
On Graves of Jewish Servicemen
Fulton Oursler's radio re-
port on Sunday evening, on
the Winchell hour, that Mar-
shal Jo-sef Stalin would come.
out with a statement endors-
ing Zionist aims lacked sub-
stantiation.
Independent Jewish Press
Service reported this week
that its check-up showed the
report to be grossly exagger-
ated. -
As long as Great Britain
and Russia are allies in the
war, JPS states, Russia will
not do anything antagonistic
to England.
A soldier reading the inscription on a Jewish marker in the
The JPS report states, how- military
cemetery of Attu.
ever, that Russia may issue a
The
responsibility
of the Na- Jewish prayers be recited over
statement favoring free im-
migration of Jews to Pales- tional Jewish Welfare Board is the _ ir remains," Mr. Weil said.
"It is a great satisfaction to
not limited to the living, but ex-
tine. ,
know that the War and Navy
The „attempted attack on
High Commissioner Sir Har-
old MacMichael, on the eve
Mass Murder Marks German Evacuation from Lithuanian of hrs. departure from Pales-
tine, was deeply deplored in
Capital; Jewish Partisans Emerging ,from Forests
Zionist circles this week.
to Return to Liberated Byelorussian Cities
LONDON, (JTA)—Ten-thousand JeWs were murdered
in Kaunas, capital of Lithuania, lust prior to the German
evacuation of the city, it is reported by the Stockholm cor-
respondent to the London Times. Information reaching the
Swedish capital, he writes, says that Jews are fiercely resist- ,
ed Nazi extermination squads, using arms which had been
Friday, August It, 1944
Government-in-Exile S a y
All Will Get Indemnity
For Seized Property
NEW YORK (JPS)—"Full in-
demnity" from Germany for all
property confiscated by the Nazis
and "substantial damages for
other injuries" were promiSed
survivors of Polish Jewry by the
Polish government-in-exile in its
Bulletin, Pacts and Figures, pub-
lished here.
Discussing prewar anti-Semi-
tism in Poland, Prime Minister
Stanislaw Mikolajczyk of the
Polish government-in-exile states
in an article in the recent issue of
Collier's.
- . Fights Side by Side
"Poland, I feel, is through with
that sort of thing. For five years,
Jews and Christians have fought
,,side by side, and out of the com-
mon struggle for a common
fatherland* has come a new un-
derstanding upon which we mean
to build nobly."
The article is presented under
the Prime Minister's by-line "as
told to George Creel," Washing-
tozr editor of the magazine.
kolajczyk describes "as our na-
tional heroes, shrined in the
heart of every Pole," the Jews
Samuel Zygielbojrn, who conk
mitted suicide, and Michael Klep-
fisz, who died on the barricades
of the Warsaw Ghetto.
Wife Interned
(Underground workers, who
had left Poland a -Week ago to
report to the Polish government-
in-exile, reported that the wife
of Premier Mikolajczyk is , in-
terned at Oswiecim. In the case
of small children, the Polish un-
derground emissaries said, the
Nazis simply killed them with
iron sticks," according to Lewis
Gannett in a cable to the New
York Herald. Tribune from Lon-
don.)
Mikolaczyk, it was learned,
will propose the inclusion of Dr.
Emil Sommerstine, Zionist and
chief of the department of war
supplies for the Soviet-endorsed
Committee of National Liberation
at Chelm, in his cabinet in a plan
to merge both committees.
Plan $100,000 Hillel Home in
Tribute to Schanfarber
COLUMBUS, 0., (JPS) — A
campaign is now under way to
raise the sum of $100,000 for the
erection of a new home for the
Hillel FoUndation at Ohio State
University, to be named , for the
late Edwin J. Schanfarber, Co-
lumbus attorney active for years
in Bnai Brith.
tends to the - heroic Jewish dead,
Frank L. Weil, president, reveal'
ed in a statement describing ac-
tion taken by the War Depart-
ment to ensure proper marking
of Jewish graves and the holding
of Jewish services in military
cemeteries in every theater of
war.
"In keeping with the dictates
of our religion and the responsi-
bility vested in us by the Jewish
communities of America, it is one
of JWB's major concerns to see
that the graves of those members
of our faith who give their lives
for their country are properly
marked with a Mogen. Doyid
Marker and that the required
Bnai Brith Aids
Freed Refugees
OSWEGO, N. Y.—At the re-
quest of the U. S. Department of
Interior, Bnai Brith has under-
taken 'to equip and furnish a
number of hospitality houses,
nursery and arts and crafts facil-
ities at the Emergency Refugee
Shelter, Fort Ontario, Oswego,
N. Y.
This shelter, better known as
the first "free port," established
by the President of the United
States, houses 982 European ref-
ugees of 19 nationalities who are
given sanctuary under the super-
vision of the War Relocation Au-
thority.
The refugees, who arrived at
Oswego last Friday, found that
the National War Service Fund
of Bnai Brith, had made avail-
able to them the equipment of a
large community house (120 ft.
by 60 ft.), four hospitality houses,
comprising 12 rooms - of substan-
tial dimensions, a nursery for
children and two arts and crafts
rooms for vocational and thera-
peutic purposes.
Mexico to Form "Free Ports"
MEXICO CITY (JTA) — The
Mexican Government has offi-
cially announced its intention to
establish a "free port" for Jew-
ish refugees along the same lines
as the United States, provided
that the refugees will maintain
themselves, or will be maintained
by relief organizations.,
The exact location orthe pro-
posed haven was not indicated in
the announcement. The refugees
will have to be mostly women
and children and must return to
their native lands "once the war
circumstances or the persecution
by totalitarian regimes has
ceased."
Leadership Institute
Cancelled by Hillels
. . .
Departments share our concern
and are doing everything in their
power to ensure proper marking
of Jewish graves."
As evidence of this concern.
Mr. Weil referred to a letter
from the War Department, di-
recting commanding officers of
all theaters, of war, overseas
-bases, and defense commands to
assign a Jewish chaplain in their
several commands to visit the va-
rious cemeteries, check with the
Graves Registration Officer to
the end that . a Jewish marker .is
placed on every
Jewish grave,
e
and to conduct a Jewish memo-
rial service. •
FLASH
260 Die on
Sunk Ship
Two hundred sixty refu-
gees from Romania perished
on the Turkish ship Nerkure
which was torpedoed seven
miles off the coast of Turkey
on Tuesday.
Jewish Book Month
Observance Set for
Nov. 10 to Dec. 10
The appointment of Abraham
H. Cohen as chairman of the
Jewish Book Month Committee
has been announced by Dr. Mor-
decai Soltes, president of the
Jewish Book Council of America,
of which the National Jewish
Welfare Board is sponsor-co-
ordinator.
Jewish Book Month will take
place from Nov. 10 to Dec. 10,
with the concluding seven days
to be obsed as Jewish Book
Week, Dr. Soltes said. .
The Jewish Book. Month Com-
mittee of the Council will initi-
ate a program of speciM activi-
ties and projects for the nation-
wide observance of Jewish Book
Month.
The third Jewish Book An-
nual, a co-operative undertaking
of the three major language
groups of Jewish literary ex-
pression (English, Hebrew and
Yiddish) is already in press.
Russian Relief, JNF Get
$160 in Press' Honor
Contributions amounting to
$160 were raised for the Russian
War Relief and the Jewish Na-
tional Fund in honor of the Bar
Mitzvah of William Press, son of
Mr. and Mrs. Nathan Press of
2466 Buena Vista Ave.
William's Bar Mitzvah was sol-
emnized Saturday morning at
the Bnai David.
At the dinner in his honor on
Sunday evening at the Work-
men's Circle Hall, Joseph Block,
president of Bnai David, made
an appeal which resulted in gifts
of $100 to the Russian War Re-
lief and $60 to the Jewish Na-
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — The first
national Bnai Brith Hillel Lead-
ership Training Institute, which
was to have been held at Camp
Onibar on Lake Como, Wayne
County, Pa., Sept. 1-10, has been
cancelled in compliance with the
request of the Office of Defense
Transportation to 'make available
all possible transportation facili-
ties for war purposes, it was an-
nounced by Dr. A. L. Sachar, di-
tional Fund.
rector of Hillel Foundations.