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- Eli Freeman's grandmother (?)
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- Udel, Eli, Max and Harry Freeman, Ukraine circa 1907
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- Yiddish inscription on back of postcard
My wife’s grandfather was Eli Freeman, who was born in the Ukraine around 1895. He came to this country as a teenager and later brought his mother and two brothers here. One of my wife’s Detroit (where Eli initially settled) relatives sent us two amazing historic photographs which we’re trying to decipher. The first image above (middle) is of Eli (the older boy, standing) his brothers Harry and Max and his mother, Udel (my wife’s great-grandmother). We figure the photo was taken around 1907 when Eli still lived in the Ukraine.
The back of the card is filled with Yiddish script in faded ink which I asked archivist Jesse Cohen and the folks at YIVO to help decipher. Under their good auspices, they came up with a rough (there is also dark felt adhesive which further obscures the script) translation:
Your cousin is sending you this card of himself with mother and with the children, and is asking you very much to save/rescue [us?] with God’s help. I can write you [that] by us in Postev, by mother, I met …. I greet [you], and mother greets you [unreadable].
So this would be Eli writing to a cousin already in America begging for help in immigrating to America. If he wrote this in 1907, it would be only four years after one of the most heinous acts of anti-Jewish violence in the region, the 1903 Kishniev pogrom, in which scores of Jews were murdered in cold blood by Ukrainian Cossacks and rioters. The reason Eli begs for help is that he probably worries that his town could be next and seeks to emigrate before further violence engulfs his family. The pogroms spurred a mass Jewish exodus to America and other lands which eventually caused one-third of all Russian Jews to leave.
If anyone viewing the script (enlarged in this image) can further decipher it please leave your translation as a comment or e mail me.
As near as we can tell, the image of the single woman might be Eli’s grandmother. She clearly looks like a Ukrainian peasant, though aside from that it’s hard to tell. No one even remembers what her name was and she never came to America.
Tags: anti semitism, jewish, Ukraine
Thanks for an interesting bit of history. I’m glad they made it to America.
Thanks for sharing. I love looking at old family pictures. Wish I could be of help to you with this mystery, but alas my facility in Hebrew is… nada. And my knowledge of late 19th century/turn of the century Ukrainian Jewish history is similarly abysmal.
I bet there are a lot of people who read this blog who are steeped in Hebrew language and know that particular regional history, though, and might be able to fill in some blank spaces. Best of luck.
Sorry, I realize looking at my comment again I accidentally wrote Hebrew twice instead of Yiddish. I do know the difference. My apologies for this space-out…
Richard,
At this moment I’m reading a fascinating book, “Annie’s Ghosts” by Steve Luxenberg. His ancestors, also from Russia/Ukraine settled in Detroit after the great emigration of the late 19th/early 20th century.
Perhaps his bibliographic section wd be useful to you. He’s a Washington Post editor who did a lot of research.
Good luck to you. I’d love to know my roots, but do not have energy or resources to trace.
ellen
My father’s side of the family immigrated from that era and area around the same time. My father passed away when I was in my teens and I lost contact with that side of the family. I’ve always wondered about their history – so I always enjoy hearing the details from others that have similar roots.
I hope you are able to get more information on the content of that artifact so you can have a follow-up post.
Richard – thanks for this, fascinating (if somewhat grim) bit of family and social history!
Out of interest, do you know whether any of your wife’s family remained in Ukraine and whether you might have some in-laws there today?
My grandmother was a Freeman, and we don’t know anything about her father’s origins because she wasn’t raised by him. We do have a picture and the clothing and facial characteristics looks very Russian-Jewish (clothes- typical working class, Russian clothing, and he had slightly hooded eyes). I’m interested in genealogy and would love to find out more about his origins, thanks for sharing your photos! I’m not sure if we are related, who knows, but your family history is very fascinating.