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August
12, 1942
...The
idea of the forest returned and came to life. After the second
mass-murder all of us were certain that the Germans made no
difference between one Jew and another... They deceived the
Judenrat and the Jewish Police when they promised them that
they would stay alive if they helped to carry out the
slaughter, and in the end they killed them too. Once more we
began to search for ways of escape outside the ghetto....
The
first to escape were Jews from the neighborhood to Naliboki
Forest. They disappeared and nothing more was heard of them.
The people from Zhetl also went, to Lipiczanka Forest, and
they were joined by some from Nowogrodek, who returned after a
while to take with them their relatives and friends. From them
we heard details of life in the forest. They have arms, they
carry out attacks on Germans traveling on the roads; the
peasants are afraid of them and supply them with food. There
are Russian partisans in the forest who live on good terms
with the Jews and carry out joint attacks on the Germans with
them.
Young
boys of 15 to 17 snatch arms from the Germans and fix stocks
to pistols and rifles. A small group got together and moved
out to the Belskis. Two of them came back to the ghetto. They
would have nothing to do with anyone there, and refused to
speak to their former friends weren't they partisans? They
went back to the forest and took with them their relatives,
wives and acquaintances.
[1943]
As
a result of our many attacks on the Germans in the area of our
camp, a German assault was to be expected any day. Information
reached us that the Germans knew where we were. The Staff
decided to dissolve the separate groups and to reestablish the
Brigade.
At
the beginning of April all the groups were ordered to leave
their valleys and move within 24 hours to Brozova Forest in
Stara-Huta.
We
packed our belongings, filled our knapsacks, and fastened our
blankets on top of them. The cooking gear and other things
were loaded on carts and we moved out. The night was cloudy
and the sky full of rain. The damp penetrated into the very
marrow of our bones. The dry, bare branches of the young trees
waved and bent hither and thither. Our thoughts were black
too. Many of us had been lost in our wanderings from forest to
forest, from base camp to base camp. They had fallen, and who
knew what awaited us at the next base?
by
day the snow began to melt. Long pools of water stretched
along the sandy paths. We had many kilometers to go. Our feet
sink in the mud as though it were soft dough. You want to rest
and there is no place to sit. Everything is wet and damp. Now
we have found a kind of hillock from which the water has run
off. The people sit down, rest, eat their fill and then
continue on their way. In this way we crossed forests, fields,
and roads until we reached Brozova Forest, in Stara-Huta.
There
we found groups that had arrived before us -- the group of
Yudel Belski, who had lost 10 of his best men; he had few
fighting men and their arms were poor: the group could no
longer survive on its own. Also the Dworecki group, which had
arrived early at the new base. The cold was not yet over and
they had built huts for themselves.
After
a brief consultation we decided not to build huts. We found a
dry hill, stretched out on our knapsacks, rested and set about
putting up a shelter of branches.
In
the course of a few days all the groups gathered in one place.
We began to live according to the plan that had applied before
the winter. Every evening the whole unit assembled. One
platoon was selected for guard duty for the next 24 hours;
several groups were sent out to get food; the people were
divided up according to kitchens, each group doing its own
cooking. The groups received their supplies from a central
store, in accordance with the number of its members.
At
the beginning of April a group of Jews and their families were
sent to us from the Iskra (spark) group. Their arms
were taken from them and they were told to join the Jewish
company. These were the first Jewish refugees from Lida
Ghetto. The young and single people stayed with the
Russians....
J.
Jaffe, Partizanim ("Partisans"), Tel Aviv,
1951, pp. 24-25, 70-72. |
