Member-only story
Pierogis and Pogroms
A Violent Raid in Bialystok
Regina Anuszewicz squeezed her eyes shut as she hid inside the closet of her sister’s room. Her breath tightened as she heard Russian soldiers stomping their feet downstairs. As she heard them shout, she tried to make herself as small as she could, blending her body in with the clothes, scarves, and shoes.
I wish I could just disappear.
She tried to slow down her breathing as she felt the pounding of her heart in her head.
A loud bang and a thud sounded like the front door had been kicked down. Heavy footsteps continued from room to room and shouts in Russian came closer and closer to the closet.
Regina, 16, had come to Bialystok to visit her older sister, Chaja Fajga, who worked as a spinner at the Lewandowski textile mill, situated along the Bialy River. They had plans to meet when Chaja Fajga finished her shift and enjoy a picnic with the special pierogi their mother had made for them.
When Regina arrived for a lovely June weekend, she dropped her bundle at her sister’s boarding house and stepped outside to walk several blocks to the mill. She stopped suddenly when she heard loud voices and saw soldiers running down the street, some on horseback, some on foot, wielding their swords at anyone who did not run away fast enough. Blood dripped from their blades, and the wounded lay screaming on the ground.
As Regina scurried back inside the building, locked the door and ran up the stairs to the bedroom, she heard gunfire coming closer. She had read about pogroms after a wave of anti-Jewish riots swept through Ukraine and Poland. They had begun in Russia and devastated several Jewish communities. Soldiers were known to rape women and often killed them. When some women realized that soldiers were coming for them, they killed themselves rather than suffer such horrific abuse.
Gunfire echoed throughout the streets, and the pitiful screams of people begging for their lives were mixed with the soldier’s jeering and laughter. Regina couldn’t bear to imagine what was taking place outside the boarding house.
The footsteps inside the boarding house came closer. She squeezed her eyes tight, hoping the soldiers wouldn’t open the closet. After the noise…
