Boy with a Violin

A Story of Survival

Yochanan Fein, Penina Reichenberg

• Publisher: Indiana University Press
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN: 9780253060563
• eBook ISBN: 9780253060587
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Historical Biographies

On June 22, 1941, the German invasion of the Soviet Union began. In a matter of days, the war reached the suburbs of Kaunas, Lithuania, where a young Jewish violinist, Yochanan Fein, led a happy childhood. On June 22, 1941, that childhood ended.

In Boy with a Violin, Fein recounts his early life under Nazi occupation—his survival in the Kaunas Ghetto, the separation from his parents, his narrow escapes from death at the hands of Nazi officers, the harrowing stories of those he knew who did not survive, and the abhorrent conditions he endured while in hiding. He tells the tale of his rescuer, Jonas Paulavi?ius, the Lithuanian carpenter who sought to save the Jewish spirit. Paulavi?ius rescued those he believed could rebuild in the wake of the Holocaust, hiding engineers and doctors in his underground Noah's Ark. Among the sixteen he saved stood one fourteen-year-old violinist.

Following liberation, Fein describes the aftermath of the war as survivors returned to what was left of their homes and attempted to piece together the fragmented remains of their lives. He recounts the difficulties of returning to some semblance of normal life in the midst of a complex political climate, culminating in his daring escape from Soviet Lithuania.

In one of the darkest eras of human history, there were those who proved that the goodness of the human spirit survives against all odds. Boy with a Violin pays tribute to those who risked everything to save a life, and whose altruism crossed the boundaries of race and religion. In this first English translation of Boy with a Violin, Fein continues to offer his testimony to the strength of the human spirit.

PART

I

PROLOGUE

IT WAS A BONE-CHILLING NIGHT IN THE WINTER OF 1942—A night when no one would leave their homes, not just because of the curfew imposed on them by the German occupiers, but because of the brutally cold wind and snow. On nights such as this one, no merciful farmer would even let a dog out. On such a night, a man crossed the Nemunas River from Šančiai, on the outskirts of Kaunas, to the other suburb, Panemunė, that was across the river. The Nemunas River waters were frozen, and the man walked across the ice to a house close to the shore, secluded and far from other homes. After much hesitation, he knocked on the door. It was an unusual time of night for a visit, so the man of the house hesitated for a minute. When he opened the door, standing there was a dirty, bearded figure dressed in rags with torn shoes. He was just skin and bones. The stranger entered and collapsed.

This was the home of the Paulavičius family, made up of four people: the father, Jonas Paulavičius; his wife, Antanina; the oldest daughter, Danutė; and the younger son, Kęstutis. The man who had just come to their home was a Russian prisoner who escaped from a POW camp on the shore of the Nemunas River. The river was meant to be a natural barrier to prevent escape. It was a tremendous risk to open the door to an escapee, but in spite of that, the man of the house welcomed him into his home. He fed him and provided him with clothes, and without any hesitation, Jonas invited the man to stay, hoping that he would survive until the Red Army’s victory, which would bring defeat to the soldiers of the Third Reich.

The prisoner surprised him with his answer. He declined. And then he explained: he had come as a messenger for his friends in the Šančiai POW camp, and he left with the help of a merciful guard who had been willing to take a risk for him. He promised his friends and the guard that he would return with food. “If I save myself,” he said, “they will die.” The Paulavičiuses accepted his explanation and supplied him with food. Before his departure back to the POW camp, Jonas Paulavičius and the Russian prisoner (whose name I can no longer recall), made a pact. Jonas promised the man that if he would have a chance to escape again, he would have a safe place to stay with him. They departed with a handshake, the strong hand of the Lithuanian farmer meeting the weak hand of the Russian prisoner.

1

WHO WAS THIS MAN?

JONAS PAULAVIČIUS WAS BORN IN 1898 IN A POOR LITHUANIAN farmhouse, and, I believe, he was the third of six children. A small plot of land, owned by the family, was primitively cultivated and barely provided for them. Considering this, it’s no wonder that each child, from an early age, looked for a way out of a house that lacked warmth and sustenance. So, Jonas found himself, fourteen years old, having had no regular schooling, making his own way in life. He was taken in as an apprentice in a carpentry shop and slowly learned the secrets of the trade. The young boy grew to be a rough and sturdy man.

During World War I (1914–1918), Lithuania was conquered by the Germans and gained its independence at the end of the war. Jonas, having no home, volunteered in a unit of the young Lithuanian army that fought the war of independence for Lithuania. The independent Lithuanian government honored the group of volunteers (savanoriai) with medals of honor and granted them a special status with material benefits. Jonas received a plot of land, about three thousand square meters, in Panemunė, a partially agricultural suburb of Kaunas. One side of the land bordered the Nemunas River, and the other side bordered Vaidoto Street, the main thoroughfare of the suburb.

Jonas built his house with his own hands. It was a two-story wooden home with stairs on the inside. He never quite finished it, but his family had a roof over their heads. He worked as a carpenter in the railway’s workshops in Šančiai, across the river. His life as a laborer was difficult, but in his heart, he remained a farmer who loved the land and knew its virtues. What he planted and harvested on his land helped to feed and provide for his family.

In the 1920s and 1930s, Jonas sided with the political left. He was open to the ideas of equality and a better future. Although he was not a member of the underground Communist Party, he was a supporter from the sidelines. Some say that before World War II, the heads of the party, who were being hunted by the Lithuanian Secret Police, found shelter in his home. Among them was the secretary of the party, Antanas Sniečkus, who at one point even operated an underground printing press from Jonas’s house.

In 1940, Lithuania became a Soviet Republic, in accordance with the secret part of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact.¹ Jonas was then selected by his workplace as a representative to the professional union of railway workers.

2

A JEWISH BOY AND HIS PARENTS

ON JUNE 26, 1941, ON THE FOURTH DAY OF THE GERMAN INVASION of the Soviet Union, the Germans reached Kaunas. The anti-Soviet, pro-Nazi “partisans” started going wild. Thousands of Jews were murdered in the first days of the invasion. Those same pro-Nazi partisans—known as Žaliukai (“the green ones”)—imprisoned Jonas, among others. After a few months, the German conquerors took full control and squashed down any ideas about Lithuanian independence. This new German government excelled in rigidity. In an effort to expose Communist Party members, the Germans tested the prisoners in jail. Whoever “passed” the test was allowed to live, whereas anyone who was suspected of being a member of the party was murdered. Jonas found himself facing a German officer. Since he had a basic competency in German, he used it to prove that he was not a member of the Communist Party. He could not deny his activity in the labor union for workers in the workplace, but he explained that this was not a political role, and therefore the Nazi officer decided to release him.

Jonas returned home, knowing he had just been saved by a miracle and that the difference between life and death had depended on the snap decision of the Nazi officer. He asked himself what he ought to do with the freedom restored to him; how would he explain to his Communist friends upon their return (for he had no doubt they would triumph over the Germans) what he had done to resist the occupation? First, he found the broadcast frequency of Radio Moscow, and he listened religiously to the Lithuanian-language broadcasts. He recognized the voice of his favorite broadcaster, Balys Baranauskas, who would become a central figure in Soviet Lithuania: a colonel during the war in the Lithuanian Red Army, established on Soviet land. The man called on all Lithuanians to oppose the occupiers in any way possible: as partisans with weapons; through passive struggle; by sabotage in the workplace; or by saving fugitives.

Next, Jonas decided to save lives. As he was making his plans, something happened that hurried his efforts: A Jewish family named Schames was interned in the Kaunas Ghetto. Their son, Shima’leh, was born before the war. When the ghetto gates closed on August 15, 1941, Shima’leh was about a year or a year and a half old. In early 1944, the Schames family decided to do everything in their power to save the boy, who by then had already turned four. In a roundabout manner, the family made contact with their Lithuanian neighbor from before the war. The family lived in the suburb of Šančiai, the area around which my story unfolds as well. They begged the neighbor to save their child for a fee. But the neighbor refused, claiming he lived in a house with many neighbors and that he was well known in the area, as was his entire family. In spite of this, he promised to look for another refuge for the child. He said he knew a man with a compassionate heart who lived in an isolated house, and he hoped that the man would accede to the request and accept the child.

After a while, the plan came to fruition. The man turned to Jonas Paulavičius, and his answer was affirmative, though not final: “I must check with my wife,” said Jonas. A day later, he came back with a final reply. Jonas and Antanina Paulavičius agreed to take a risk and provide shelter for the young Jewish boy.

The child’s adjustment in the family’s home was difficult since he grew up in the closed cage of the ghetto and never heard any language other than Yiddish. Suddenly, the boy was cut off from his family and his Jewish brothers and turned over to very grave people who spoke a strange foreign language. He cried nonstop because of all the limitations and restrictions forced upon him in a language he did not understand. He was forbidden to go downstairs or to leave his room. He was forbidden to make noise and was even forbidden to cry. But Shima’leh did not stop crying, and his spirit broke before his saviors’ eyes.

The Paulavičius family lived in fear of their secret being revealed. One day, when the child was playing with pieces of paper and threw them into a burning oven, a flame burst in his room. The family had reached their limit and considered returning the child to his parents.

Jonas was in constant contact with the child’s parents with the help of Aaron Neumark, a Jewish engineer in the ghetto. The engineer worked in forced labor outside the ghetto along with thousands of other Jews who would leave the ghetto in Jewish brigades. On occasion, when Jonas was to update the parents about their son and receive instructions, he would travel to Kaunas, to the brigade’s place of work, and meet with Neumark. There were risks in doing this. The German guards were used to the sight of Lithuanians approaching the Jews and trying to trade with them. The Jews would sell objects and clothes for food in trade that was called beitten zachen in Yiddish (“barter of clothing”). This time, Jonas approached Neumark with a heavy heart; he had come to tell him that the child would have to return to the ghetto. The danger was just too great.

Several days later, Jonas returned to get the parents’ answer from Neumark: the parents refused to take back their son. Was such a thing possible? No doubt the parents were convinced that the good-hearted Jonas would find a solution to the problem, would not expose their son to danger, and would continue to hide him as before. Under the circumstances, Jonas recommended that the parents quickly close things up in the ghetto and join their child. This was not a simple decision; there was a grandmother as well, the mother of Mrs. Schames, and she could not be left behind. And so, due to the circumstances, four members of one family arrived at the Paulavičius’ house: the boy, Shima’leh; his parents, Lena and Itzhak Schames; and Mrs. Feinsilber, Lena’s mother.

3

THE GOAL—SAVING THE INTELLECTUALS

JONAS DID NOT STOP COMING UP WITH NEW PLANS. HE lacked formal education, but his logic was ironclad. Since he did not want to leave his family and go armed into the forest, he chose to save Jews as his means of fighting against the Nazis. This was his only way of opposing the occupiers. He could take advantage of the geography of his secluded house, which bordered the Nemunas River and was surrounded by a three-thousand-square-meter garden with many hiding places. Another advantage was that only a few people visited his home because Jonas was a tough, unfriendly man, and the family maintained a position of seclusion toward their surroundings. He set his goal—saving Jews—as a communist and a humanist. Jonas assumed that rescue operations should begin at a relatively late stage, when the Soviet soldiers would be approaching and there would be a reasonable chance that the Nazi occupiers would soon be driven out. It was impossible to hide many Jews for long. The many dangers and difficulties in obtaining food were among the main factors preventing such a rescue operation.

Jonas contemplated which Jews he would save. He couldn’t possibly save them all. Therefore, he came to a tough decision: to save Jewish intellectuals, on the assumption that after the mass destruction, the nation would need leaders and educated people. Those who would find refuge with him would be the educated, doctors, and engineers. He turned to the Schames family, who had already been in hiding in his house, and asked them for names of Jews who would meet the criteria. The Schameses told him about two doctors, husband and wife Chaim and Tanya Ipp, who lived in the ghetto and had saved the Schames’ son from a bad bout with pneumonia. When the engineer, Aaron Neumark, came to Chaim Ipp as Jonas’s messenger and told him that a Lithuanian wanted to save him and his family, the doctor refused to believe it. When Neumark explained that the offer was the result of a special ideology to save educated Jews, it seemed even stranger to Chaim. Dr. Chaim Ipp was convinced that Jonas was a provocateur, and therefore he became even more strongly opposed to getting involved with him. But when he told his wife, Tanya, she was angry at his rash reply to Jonas’s offer. Due to the horrors of the ghetto and the hardships they encountered, she was willing to take the risk of examining the proposal. She did not believe that a man would actually seek out doctors and, instead of rescuing them, hand them over to the...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Part I
• Part II
• Part III
• Epilogue
• Notes
• About the Author