In conclusion I wish to express my gratitude to all my fellow-workers on the Relief Committee. My indebtedness to them is twofold — for the moral satis-, faction of work done together in aid of the wretched victims of the pogroms and for the stupendous, tireless work of gathering the evidence that has made possible the writing of this summary. I must make special mention of those who stood closest to me in the work: Dr. P. I. Rosenthal (Anman), Dr. F. E. Lander, Mr. L. V. Fraenkel, Mr. S. Y. Heifetz, Dr. L. N. Heller, Mr. A. I. Hillerson, and Mr. Isaac Gutermann.
ELIAS HEIFETZ.
NEW YORK, December 20, 1920.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
F A. I. HILLERSON
[fragment illegible in the scan of the first edition]
III. FELSHTIN ( F PODOLIA). 227 SUPPLEMENT TO CHAPTER III
AND
CHAPTER
THE terrible Jewish massacres in the Ukraine in the year 1919, which set the whole land aflame, can not be compared with the pogroms in the eighties and during the first decade of our century. The latter form, in essence and scope, a chapter in themselves. The tsarist regime endeavored to divert the attention of the socially and politically discontented masses in another direction, the direction of least resistance. This they did by inciting the ignorant and intimidated lower classes against the defenseless Jews, who, they alleged, were responsible for the misery of the people. The Jews were represented as the exploiters of the people, as leeches, who sucked the blood of the peasant and robbed him of the fruits of his economic activity. Later, when the elemental forces of the revolution burst forth and whipped the waves of passion into high fury, the Jews were depicted by the agents of tsarism before the lowest classes of the people as the "leaders of unrest and rebellion, who were rising against the Fatherland and the 'Little Father* (the tsar)." The Jewish pogroms coincide with the critical moments of the then regime and follow in scope and intensity a course parallel to that of the revolution.
The pogroms of the eighties correspond to the revo-
UKRAINE
lutionary movement of the intelligentzia organized as "Narodniki" ("Zemlya i Volya," "Narodnaya Volya"). Those in the beginning of our century, to the time of the first revolution ( 1903-1905)» correspond to the great revolutionary strikes in the south of Russia. Finally, the third pogrom wave, which came right after the revolution (end of 1905 and 1906), corresponds to the outbreak of the first revolution itself. The aim of the pogroms in the eighties was mainly the destruction of Jewish possessions. There was robbery and plunder, down and feathers were scattered to the wind, furniture was broken to pieces, valuables and money were taken away. In many cases women were violated, men beaten, but "with moderation," not to death. The pogroms, however, in Kishinev (1903), Gomel (1903) and Zhitomir (April, 1905), already began to assume a bloody course. Jews were murdered, the victims numbered many dozens. After the revolution (1905 and 1906) the pogroms expanded both in space and in time, with about a thousand victims. The organizing activity of the lower and middle administrative officers was clearly visible, as was shown in the judicial investigations. The parliamentary commission of the first imperial Duma, the revelations of the former active minister of internal affairs, Prince Urussov, and of the former director of the police department, Lopuchin, confirmed what was generally known, that the threads of the entire pogrom propaganda were held together in the hands of the highest representatives of the state force, the all powerful minister of internal affairs and the director of the police. They determined the places where pogrom dramas were to be enacted, and gave proper instructions to the local authorities.
The pogroms of the tsarist period took place almost exclusively in the south, in the Ukraine, and particularly in the Ukrainian cities. The large Ukrainian cities like Kiev, Odessa, and Yekaterinoslav formed favorable grounds for anti-Jewish agitation by reason of the great wealth and economic activity, the accentuated class differences and the numerous tramp class existing in those places. The officials and the professional classes (teachers, clergy, partly also the professors) in the southern cities were almost exclusively on the side of the Black Hundred. The central government took great care to see that all those who were in their service were thoroughly "reliable," i.e., that they were in complete accord with the reactionary politics of the central government and carried out their orders in their several localities.