[Cz-L] World War One in Bukowina

Hello everybody!
Further to Mimi's question about WWI in Bukowina, here is what I know - it is an English version of a chapter of my book, put up after many different readings.
>From time to time, and as far as I know it, I mention what happened to members of my family - they are Leib and Regina Lackner (maternal ggrandparents) who were a time in Vienna (from the archives in Vienna I got copies of police notes about their leaving back to Cz) Haim Schmiele and Mina Rosner (paternal grandparents) Joseph David and Netti Wagner (maternal grandparents)
Here it goes: it's a bit long and hopefully you will not get bored.
Regards,
Charles Rosner
          Chapter 4 - World War One

The First World War in Bukovina didn’t end up in trench warfare like in Western Europe. On the contrary, being far from Vienna and bordering on Russia, the province became the scene of a permanent movement war: its capital Czernowitz for example, located at some thirty kilometers from the Russian border, changed hands six times during the four years of the war.

On 26th July 1914, a partial mobilization order is posted in Czernowitz; this is followed nine days later by a general mobilization. Some inhabitants have already left the city. But the patriotic spirit and the attachment to the Emperor Franz Joseph still predominate among those who stay: the majority remains confident.
The first battle – which the Austrian won, by the way – takes place a month later on 23rd August, at a distance of only eight kilometers from the town. Many city dwellers using binoculars watch it happening from the top of Czernowitz’s hills.
But, a week later, there is no more regular Austrian army in Bukovina; and, upon its withdrawal, it blew up the bridges that crossover the Pruth River in the capital.

The municipality council tries to organize, in anticipation of the enemy’s occupation of the city. The first victims from outside arrive, telling about horrible practices by Cossack patrols; like a Jewish peasant and his daughter who could do it to the town hall: his tongue and his ten fingers have been cut-off.
On Wednesday 2nd September, the Russian are in fear of a trap and send an emissary: they do wait nearby the sugar factory for the town authorities to come and to surrender without condition; otherwise the town will be destroyed and razed down to earth!
Dr Salo von Weisselberger – the last Jewish Mayor who got elected in 1913 – goes to the meeting, accompanied by the lawyer Philipp Menczel. Both explain to a Russian officer that a formal surrender ceremony is superfluous, because the Austrian troops have gone and the city is in their power. The Mayor adds, in German: “We hope that your troops will treat correctly the civil population, which is peaceful and non-aggressive, when they will enter the city.” The meeting lasts no more than five minutes.

Meanwhile in Czernowitz, the population did gather in dense groups on the main street, waiting silently for further developments. Jews from Sadagura arrive at lawyer Menczel’s place: they are terrorized and describe the Cossack’s terrible behavior in their town. Menczel gets there immediately with his wife, who is dressed in her nurse’s uniform of the Red Cross. To an officer who calls out to her, she retorts that his Cossacks steal, assassinate and plunder in Sadagura. No, that’s not true! is his harsh reply. But another officer recognizes her husband as a member of the surrender delegation. She repeats her accusations, adding that this is not the way the army of a country of culture should behave. Cooling down, the captain answers that he cannot do anything for the time being, because he must take position in Czernowitz; but also that, immediately thereafter, he will send a patrol to Sadagura. He kept his word.
The very same evening, the Russian troops occupy Czernowitz.
During the following days and weeks, the Russian officers do their best to appear as civilized, but they have a hard time keeping control of their troops on the country outside the capital: the Cossacks take it violently on the population, plundering and ransoming as they can. Northern Bukovina is massively destroyed. Of course, the entire population is affected, but they take it more particularly on the Jewish communities: Sadagura and Wiznitz are plundered and put on fire, as well as all the synagogues in the area; the Hassidic court of Boja is razed down to earth…

Meanwhile, the southern part of Bukovina is spared from the battles: that’s where the gendarmerie Major Eduard von Fischer calls for volunteers and organizes the armed resistance. In less than two months, on 21 October, his troops are back in Czernowitz.

Many families then flee to the center of the Empire, most of them towards Vienna. Given the extent of the phenomenon, the Austrian Government creates refugee’s camps in Bohemia, Moravia, Carinthia, Salzburg, etc.

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Leib Lackner and his wife Regina use the opportunity of Czernowitz’s recapture to find refuge at their children’s place in Vienna. As for Joseph David Wagner, who saw the surrender talks in September close to the sugar factory where he works, he is now mobilized. He will spend most of the wartime nearby Vienna, while his wife Netti and their five children stay in Czernowitz.

The Rosner also leave their town of Wiznitz during the November lull. But, as they have absolutely no contact in Vienna, they are directed to a refugee’s camp in Bohemia. The father Haim Schmiele joins the army as non-commissioned officer. He is a relatively tall and slim man of forty-seven, with a long face and prominent cheekbones, bearing a moustache and a small goatee.

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The Russian troops are back in Czernowitz on 26th November. All well-known and influential figures of the town – among them the Mayor von Weisselberg and the lawyer Menczel – are taken hostage and deported to Siberia. Hundreds of apartments are plundered; but most of the town and all buildings of Jewish worship are spared, thanks to the courageous intervention of Dr Vladimir von Repta, the Greek Orthodox Archbishop. He will even have the Tempel‘s Torah rolls removed into his residence, where he will protect them till the end of the war; he will then give them back to the Great Rabbi of Czernowitz, upon the return of the latter.

On 17th February 1915 – i.e. eleven weeks later and right in the middle of the winter – the Austrian army recaptures again Czernowitz.

For over a year, these battles and troop movements continue on Bukovina’s northern border, while beyond that border, in Eastern Galicia that the Russian conquered already during the summer, massive deportations take place between March and September 1915.

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Communication between Czernowitz and Vienna is again operational, but the population in both cities gets to know the wartime difficulties and restrictions.
In Vienna, Leib and Regina stay separately with two of their children, in order to lower the burden on the latter’s’ shoulders. But they are worried about their daughter’s situation, staying alone back in Czernowitz with their five grandchildren.
On 15th June 1915, Regina returns to Bukovina to be close to Netti, while Leib stays in Vienna.

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A year later, on 18th June 1916, the Russian recapture Czernowitz.

Two distant events then precipitate the end of the war in the region: Emperor Franz Joseph’s death in Vienna, in November 1916 – his nephew Charles succeeds, having the peace as main program – and the “February and October 1917 revolutions” in Russia.
By June 1917, the final Austrian recapture of Bukovina starts: Czernowitz is freed on 3rd August 1917 and, two months later, the new Emperor Charles 1st comes for an official visit to the city.

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In 1917, the Rosner are still in a refugee’s camp in Bohemia near Merisch Budowitza, the place of origin of the famous Budweiser beer. Haim Schmiele has been demobilized for health reasons: he now appears in civil clothes on a family picture, looking tired and without his goatee, but his moustache is still quite thick. On the other hand, the eldest son David, aged nineteen, is now in military uniform. On the same picture, mother Mina looks well rounded, with pinched lips and anxious eyes.

Calm and hard at work, she earned respect from all those who knew her. Recently, seeing her on a picture, the mother-in-law of my cousin Edy suddenly said “Sie war ein sehr guter Mensch!” she was a very good person!

By the end of the summer, Netti Wagner who stayed all this time in Czernowitz, hasn’t seen her husband Joseph David for almost three years. As the communication with Vienna is again operational, her mother insists that she shall travel to Vienna in spite of their meager means: she can stay at one of her brothers’ place and meet her husband, while she, Regina, will take care of the children in her absence.
Netti gets a passport at her name with a travel permit to Vienna, issued on 18th October 1917. But she won’t finally use it: now that the Russian troops stopped hostilities, the end of the war seems very close; and, in addition, Joseph David informed her that he might soon be demobilized.

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It is only on 3rd March 1918 that the peace-treaty of Brest Litovsk officially ends the Russian participation to the war.

In May 1918, Leib Lackner leaves Vienna and returns to Czernowitz.

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Emperor Charles 1st is aware of the necessity to reform the Empire in order to solve the problem of nationalities. On 18th October 1918, he addresses all his subjects and incites them to constitute National Councils in view of the creation of a Federal State. But the Jews in Bukovina – who represent the third minority in that province, where there is still no majority group – are not acknowledged as a distinct national entity.
Some Jewish leaders then decide to set aside their differences in opinion and try to organize lobbies and ways of pressure in order to have their right for self-determination be acknowledged. But they also fear that the National Councils’ process might lead to merciless fights between the two main minorities, the Rumanian and the Ukrainian ones. A few Jewish officers of the Austrian army, fully aware of this potential threat, decide discreetly to organize armed vigilante groups among Czernowitz’s Jewish population.

At first, the National Council for Bukovina decides on 28th October 1918 to incorporate the province into Rumania. The Ukrainian reaction comes a week later: more than 10,000 Ukrainians in armed bunches enter into Czernowitz and the Ukrainian National Council decrees the incorporation of Bukovina into Ukraine… The Jewish vigilante then seal off the access to the Jewish quarter in the lower part of the town and give message to the Ukrainians in charge that the Jewish persons and goods will be defended… After a while, the Ukrainian withdraw in good order, singing national songs…

Finally, on 11th November 1918, the very Armistice Day on all fronts, the Rumanian troops enter into Bukovina: a new era begins.

With the end of the war, a big number of refugees pour into Bukovina. Most of them are originally from the province, but there are also many Ukrainian Jews who try to escape the sudden outburst of pogroms taking place in 1918 in their home state.
Eight years later, a Jew named Shalom Schwarzbard will kill in Paris Simon Petlioura, an exiled Ukrainian politician who led the resistance against the Red Army. The murderer claims that Petlioura is responsible for the death of 100,000 Jews in his country. Today, the official Ukrainian history considers that a great number of these pogroms were actually organized by the Soviets and put on purpose on Petlioura’s account in order to stir up unrest and sow discord among the population. Yet, the judges in Paris decided to acquit Schwarzbard…

In Bukovina, the population of Czernowitz increases rapidly once more. Most of the newcomers are Jews and, a year later, the Jewish inhabitants count for 47.7 % of the total.

      
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Received on 2010-10-17 06:57:54