"Beyond Silence" (2015)

- by Moshe Dekel z"l, the son of Krzepice Holocaust Survivors

Moshe Dekel (Chaskelewicz) z”l was born in Munich to Krzepice Holocaust survivor parents. As a child, he tried asking his parents about their lives during the War years – and was met with silence. Dekel did not give up. As an adult, he tried to reveal the painful memories and secrets.

Having no one to ask, Dekel used radio programmes and newspaper articles to locate survivors, who knew a little about his parents. And so, from meeting to meeting, Moshe reveals a little more and another scrap of information from the past his parents had wished to conceal.

Dekel documents the exciting meetings and surprising stories he heard in his book “Beyond Silence” – a book which has turned into a sort of quest for roots, or a fascinating detective story, which traces the experiences of his family members and of Polish Jewry as a whole. Anyone who grew up in the home of Holocaust survivors can identify with it.

This quote comes from the book’s editor and publisher, Orly Amit. It is obviously the personal story of a man on a quest for his roots. However, it does contain a great deal of information about Krzepice and the vicinity, including Częstochowa.

In the absence of any formal Krzepice Yizkor Book, it has been decided to treat it as a “pseudo Yizkor Book”, to translate it into English and to publish it, here, on our website.

To this end, our translator, Dave Horowicz-Larochette, wrote to Orly Amit, seeking permission to do this.

Orly’s reply came prompty, stating:

Moshe Dekel z”l, to our great sorrow, passed away about a year and a half ago. I have approached his wife Zahava and she has given her permission to translate the book. She says that her husband, Moshe z”l, would have certainly agreed and would also have rejoiced in the initiative which originates from a desire to commemorate communities and to document the events of the Holocaust.

We sincerely thank Zahava Dekel for giving us permission to translate and publish her late husband’s book and Orly Amit for assisting us in this endeavour. We have made every effort to convey, in English, what her late husband expressed in Hebrew.

(The picture in the top left-hand corner is that of Moshe’s father, Majer Chaskelewicz z”l, in Polish Army uniform.)

This “pseudo Yizkor Book” has now been PROFESSIONALLY translated into English
– in its entirety – for the FIRST TIME!

The professional English translation of this Krzepice “pseudo Yizkor book” has been made possible by the financial support of the

Wolf Rajcher z”l and Dora Rajcher z”l were both Holocaust survivors from Częstochowa.

They were prisoners in both the “Big Ghetto” and the “Small Ghetto” and, until liberation, were slave labourers in HASAG-Pelcery. Following the War, they emigrated to Melbourne Australia.

Upon the passing of both his parents, their son, Andrew Rajcher, established this charitable fund in their memory.

Chapters are listed in the order in which they appear in the Yizkor Book.
(The numbers in brackets, after each article, correspond to the appropriate page numbers in the booklet.)

Introduction (1-3)

Table of Contents (5-5)

Preface (9-13)

The Beginnings of the Quest: Munich and the Hospital in Which I was Born (14-20)

The Towns Częstochowa, Krzepice and Lututów (21-31)

My Volunteer Work for the Holocaust Survivors (32-40)

The Work of Radio Personality Yaron Enosh (41-43)

First Meeting – Ester Pe’eri (née Mendelewicz) (44-52)

Second Meeting – Rachel Geshuri (née Granek) (53-57)

Third Meeting – Sh. (née Granek) (58-60)

Fourth Meeting – Hinda Klug (née Granek) (61-62)

Fifth Meeting – Fela Kopel (née Lachman) (63-72)

Sixth Meeting – Moti Cheruti – the Ural Mountains (73-74)

Seventh Meeting – Josef and Chana (née Lachman) Kamil (75-79)

Eighth Meeting – Cesia (Cypora) Granek (80-83)

The New Appeal to Yaron Enosh (84-85)

Ninth Meeting – Yaakov W. and [his mother] Frida (née Monat) (86-95)

Tenth Meeting – Abram-Abe Besser (96-100)

My Father Majer Chaskelewicz (101-108)

My Mother Miriam Chaskelewicz (109-113)

My Uncle Juda (Lajb) Halperin and His Family (114-117)

Zvi (Hersz) Cirulnik (118-121)

The Journey to Poland, July 2009 (122-134)

Closing Words (135-137)

A List of the Victims (138-141)

ENGLISH TRANSLATION:

Dave Horowitz-Larochette

IMPORTANT NOTICE

While this English translation is available for download, it may not, either in part or as a whole, be distributed or published without the prior written permission of Andrew Rajcher, this English-language version copyright-holder.