Copyright 1994, In Trust for THE ASHKENAZY FAMILY CIRCLE. This work may be freely used and/or copied in part or in its entirety for personal use. All portions and copies must carry this copyright notice. No commercial use is granted or implied without the express permission of "The Ashkenazy Family Circle." Contact Frank Y Askinazy, 11 Crescent Drive, Searingtown, NY 11507

PREFACE

In 1952 Manya Ashkenazy, known to her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren as "Babu," (Russian for "Gram" as in Grandmother) started to write the remarkable events of her life. She continued until shortly before her death in 1964.

This book is presented in three parts. After completing her handwritten thoughts, it was typed and organized by her daughter Sara. A writer was consulted who conducted many interviews with Manya Ashkenazy to help to organize her stories. Unfortunately the full copy of the final transcript apparently was lost in a fire some 25 years ago. Part One is the surviving first half of that completed manuscript.

In order to preserve this history, Manya's daughter Roza took on the task of rewriting the stories covering the second half of her mother's life. This was completed shortly before her own death in 1992. Part Three is this story.

In 1994 Manya Ashkenazy's original manuscript was re-discovered. Although not as well organized as the final version of Part One, it fills in many of the missing details of her story. This unedited version is presented as Part Two. It was left unedited as this was exactly as she wrote it. Although she died when many of her grandchildren and great-grandchildren were still too young to appreciate her remarkable qualities, she lives again in these pages for us. Reading her English and grammar, we can hear her speak to us. We can learn from her courage, strength and wisdom as we were not able to when we were younger.

This story is interesting to all, but it is a treasure to her progeny. All families have some stories handed down from generation to generation. Few can boast of a history as complete or as rich as this.

I

When Catherine the Great had wrested Crimea from the Turks in 1783, she received delegations representing the various national and religious groups living in the region--Tartars, Greeks, Karaites and the Turkish- speaking Jews known as Crimchaki. It is related that the Empress asked each of the delegations to state freely their demands, which would be favorably considered. Varying requests were made: some asked for business concessions, some for land and property rights, others for special legal considerations; but the Crimchaki asked for none of these things. They asked for only one privilege--the right to live in peace, as their fathers had before them in the Crimea in years past.

"To live in peace" -- that is all that the Crimean Jews have ever asked! My mothers great-grandparents, who had migrated to the Crimea from Egypt long before Catherine won it from the Turks, had apparently been reassured that this was a place where Jews might live in peace. Shortly after they settled there, they adopted the family name of "Purim", a name associated in Jewish minds, with joyousness and deliverance from oppression.

The Crimchaki (who, by the way, speak a variety of Turkish which they write in Hebrew letters) had apparently lived peaceful lives, less harassed by persecution than the Jews of Poland and Russia. However, when the Russians entered the Crimean peninsula, there was some apprehension as to how long this comparatively pleasant state of affairs might continue.

I do not know how long the peace that the Empress Catherine granted my Crimchaki ancestors endured. But I do know that a scant hundred and twenty-two years later, this serenity was disturbed by a series of dire events that rose in a crescendo of graver and more frequent peril which, during the twelve years following the Revolution of 1905, culminated finally in the flight precipitated by the Bolshevik Revolution.

Certainly I, Manya Ashkenazy, born in the Crimean town of Berdyansk in 1889, knew very little of what it meant to live in peace. When I was but a child, the dark clouds had already begun to gather upon the horizon, and I was twenty-seven when I fled before the storm, abandoning my possessions to escape with my husband and children.

Yet there were a few years of sun-filled peace in which I reveled and which I took for granted as only the innocence of childhood can.

I need only to close my eyes to see the quiet tree-lined street on which our house stood basking in the sun. The street is quiet and, except for an occasional rustle of the wind through the trees, there is no movement to be seen anywhere. Suddenly, the front door to our house is opened and a pair of great brown eyes, shining with a sense of mischief, peers out the door. A little girl's head is poked out the door a moment later, and after a hurried glance up and down the street, a tiny figure slips out the door and hurries down the street.

This was my first adventure undertaken at the advanced age of five, and yet I seem to remember it with great clarity. I had set off, without permission, to attend a party to which I had not been invited.

Invited or not, I was determined to go, and I had gotten into my nicest party dress, so hurriedly that I was entirely unaware of my appearance as I skipped down the street. The important thing was to get out of the house before my parents could stop me.

Alternately running and skipping joyously, I hurried down the street. I had managed to dress and leave the house undetected and now I was off to the home of my Aunt Kally, where the festivities were to take place.

Aunt Kally had what it seemed to me to be a tremendously large house. It had to be large to contain her family of ten children, who always seemed to be surrounded by laughter and music and the shouts of a lively chorus of energetic children. Aunt Kally's home was, in short, a happy one and her family the gayest I had ever seen.

Uncle Abraham, the breadwinner of this high-spirited family, was a cheerful little musician who played the tambourine and drums in a band that performed at weddings, bar mitzvahs and other festive occasions. He earned a comfortable living for his wife and children, numbering five sons and five daughters, and the whole family was widely known and extremely popular throughout the City of Kerch, particularly the younger people. As a matter of fact, everyone in town addressed my uncle as Little Uncle Abraham. How could you be formal with such a friendly, cheerful maker of music?

Ever since my parents had moved from Berdyansk to Kerch (I must have been three years old then), we had become frequent guests at Aunt Kally's home. We were often invited there for parties or special occasions, such as Passover seders and Purim masquerades. During these frequent visits, I used to love to wander through the house, the lower part of which contained a tinsmith's shop, run by my cousin, Saadya. This shop was a particular source of amusement to me.

Saadya, it seems, had three apprentices working for him. They were all named Chaim, so that when he called for one of them, all three came running. In the end, Saadya had to change the names of two of the apprentices--he renamed one Mischa and the other Hemcha, while the third retained his own name, Chaim.

To a child of four little things, like the renaming of apprentices, were great cause for merriment, and it was the atmosphere of laughter and good-natured fun which made this household so dear to me as a child.

Yet most of the early details are not clear in my mind, including those concerning the apprentice renamed "Mischa", who was later to become my husband. (He had been sent by his mother to learn a trade from Saadya, and at the age of eight was already working in the tinsmith's shop for three dollars a week plus room and board).

Even the details of the jolly parties, seders and masquerades are no longer clear to me. But I do remember clearly my reaction to the news that there was to be a party at Aunt Kally's to which little children were not invited. I brooded all morning, and finally decided that I would go anyway. After all, I reasoned, once I appeared they would not send me back, as it was quite a distance from my house.

And so, having made my decision, I hastened to get into the nicest dress I could find and hurried along to my Aunt Kally's party. I had only the vaguest idea as to how to get there, and it was several hours before I arrived there, hot and dust-covered, my face darkened with sweat and dirt. My appearance must have seemed very strange indeed. I certainly did not look as though I were dressed for a festive occasion--my dress was askew and not properly adjusted and buttoned, because of the haste with which I had thrown it on, and my hands, face and hair were a mess. My aunt was surprised, or more probably shocked, to see me.

Aunt Kally, who had been busy cooking, barely managed to avoid dropping the pan in her hand. She ran towards me with a cry of dismay.

"Does your mother know that you came here?" she gasped. A few seconds later, I was surrounded by the entire family and they proceeded to ply me with similar questions. I stood there, confused and silent, overwhelmed by the flood of questions. In any case, it seemed to me that the best thing to do was to say nothing; and so I continued to stand there, looking around at them silently and acting very guilty about the whole thing.

Finally, Saadya decided that I had to be brought home before my mother discovered that I was missing and began to worry about me. An excellent decision, and everything would have turned out for the best had they acted upon it! Instead they took me not to my home but to my father's shop.

Although it had taken me hours to reach Aunt Kally's, it took Saadya only a few minutes to deliver me to my father. Here, retribution was swift and stern, and I shall never forget what happened next.

When Saadya lifted me from the wagon and carried me inside, Father was shocked at my unexpected appearance. But the shock hardened into anger as he heard the story told by Saadya. His face set in grim lines, Father took me home and bade me wait outside while he spoke to Mother, who was busy with the younger children. The door was left ajar, and I could see and hear what went on inside.

"Stera, where is Manya?" my father asked.

"She is playing outside." answered Mother innocently.

Without a word, Father strode across the room and slapped her face. I could see the sudden look of shock and fright on her face, and I shall never forget the pang of sorrow and compassion I felt for my mother at that moment. Nor will I ever forget the realization that flashed through my young mind that my actions could bring pain and anguish to others.

For weeks afterwards, I heard neighbors and relatives discussing my childish adventure and wagging their heads over it. They soon forgot the incident, of course but I never did and when I became a mother myself -- and finally a grandmother -- I tried to forgive my children -- and grandchildren -- for any wild or foolish things they may have done, while pointing out to them how easy it is to hurt others unthinkingly.

How well I remember doing just that very thing once, at the age of six. My mother had just made a new red coat for me, form-fitted and padded around the hips in the latest fashion of the day. It was a lovely coat and I felt very good in it.

Soon after my new coat was ready, my parents took me with them on a visit. I was permitted to wear my beautiful new coat, although they had not dressed specially for the occasion. Carried away by pride and childish vanity, I let fall the remark that I ought to walk on the other side of the street with the well-dressed ladies and gentlemen, since I was better dressed than they were.

"Very well," replied my father. "You may do so if you like, but I will never walk with you again, and I shall never again buy you anything new -- especially clothing."

The lesson was an important one. I learned to control my tongue and, more important of all, to choose my friends because of their qualities and not because of externals. Character, manners and attitude towards other less fortunate than themselves -- these were the qualities that mattered in people.