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Recording Content:
This recording is a formal interview with Khariton Berman, born 1923 in Rivne. (Part 1 of 2. See MDV 335)
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00:00:00
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Before they begin the formal part of the interview, they discuss the team's travels and Sholem Aleichem's connection to Bila Tserkva. |
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00:03:02
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Berman talks about his involvement in Jewish cultural life in the late 1980s. Before the war, the town had a Jewish population of 30.000, of which 8000 returned. Berman set up the Sholem Aleichem Cultural Society in 1989 and supports local educational efforts. Moreover, he was one of the initiators of the Yiddish cultural society in Kyiv that was set up in 1988. |
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00:05:26
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Berman then talks about his life before the war. He was born in Rivne (Rovne) and attended a Polish school. He encountered the writer Sholem Asch and Ben Gurion in his home town. His father was a successful leather merchant and was active in associational life. His mother was the chairwoman of the local Jewish Women's Organization, which regularly invited well-known figures, such as Ben Gurion, Sholem Asch, and Ze'ev Jabotinsky. She would entertain the visitors and, therefore gave Berman the opportunity to meet them. Berman then remembers the conversation with Ben Gurion, who encouraged him to immigrate to Palestine after graduating from school. |
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00:11:57
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Berman then discusses his publications, such as a newspaper article in Yiddish about the soccer match between the local team and the Viennese team. He also published several articles in the Forverts. In particular, he mentions the article about a Jewish underground movement in Poland during World War II. |
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00:13:24
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The conversation turns to life after the war. Due to his achievements as a cardiologist in Rivne, he was made honorary citizen as the only Jew among eight honorary citizens of the city . He still works as the chief cardiologist in Bila Tserkva. The camera briefly cuts to his wife Sonya, who was born in Bila Tserkva, and they discuss Yiddish dialects. |
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00:20:21
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The conversation moves to Berman's childhood memories and family. His parents were killed in Rivne during World War II. He talks about his encounters with famous people, who socialized with his parents. Berman also wrote articles about the pogroms and talks about someone he interviewed for that purpose. |
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00:24:45
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The conversation moves to Berman's childhood memories. He did not grow up speaking Yiddish, but learned the language reading Yiddish journalism and sports magazines. He studied at a Hebrew-language school, organized by the Tarbut movement, before he switched to a Polish school. In ninth and tenth grade, Berman studied at a Russian school. He then talks about the ceremony he attended commemorating the fifty year anniversary of the Warsaw uprising, where he gave a speech in Polish. The conversation returns to his childhood years and prewar Jewish life in Rivne. He mentions different Jewish institutions, which produced a lively Jewish community in Rivne. The institutions include Jewish parties, a Yiddish and a Hebrew school, and three Jewish sport clubs. Berman traveled to Kyiv to see his relatives in 1939, one week before the war broke out. |
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00:32:41
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The interview is briefly interrupted by his daughter-in-law's arrival. Like many others in his family, she works as a doctor. |
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00:34:23
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Berman then talks about life during the war. He published material about the fate of his family during the war. His parents were executed along with their fellow Jews from Rivne during German mass killings on November 6th and 7th in the pine woods near Rivne. They set up a memorial in Yiddish. Most Jews of Rivne were murdered early on. Berman left Kyiv and went to Stalingrad in order to study at the medical institute. However, he had to interrupt his studies in 1942 due to the arrival of the Germans, and he volunteered for the Red Army. He served in the 64th division, defending Stalingrad. He was taken out of his division because of the German language skills he had acquired at the Polish school. He was favored by a Soviet commander to German writers like Wilhelm Pieck. He worked as a translator for German officers. He reached the rank of a lieutenant and saved German army officers from execution. |
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00:45:14
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Berman talks about the two films in which he is mentioned as a Jewish German-speaking lieutenant. |
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00:47:45
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Berman returns to discussing his military service in the Red Army. His division moved from Stalingrad to Prague. He helped liberate ghettos in Budapest and Vienna. Berman tells about how during the war, he was able to correspond by mail with his mother as well as with the actor Solomon Mikhoels and the writer Ilya Ehrenburg. After the war, during a surge of antisemitism, his wife burned the entire correspondence with Mikhoels. |
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00:49:56
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Berman discusses life after the war. After he graduated from the medical institute in Kyiv, he returned to BilaTserkva in 1953, where he was actively involved in promoting Yiddish culture. He published articles in the Birobidzhaner Shtern and Sovietish Heymland in the 1950s. Berman supported the publication of previously unpublished letters by Ilya Ehrenburg. |
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00:56:37
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Berman addresses his connection to the Jewish cultural organization in Kyiv. He remembers the first meetings and he was part of the organization committee, as well as part of the community. In 1989, he initiated a Yiddish cultural organization with a Yiddish theater in Bila Tserkva. He talks about how he promoted the idea of founding a Yiddish theater among his friends and colleagues. He shows a copy of a Yiddish-Polish journal, which includes a copy of Berman's article about his experience in Stalingrad. |
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