Dear Adrienne,
In addition to the valuable clues you received from Bruce, let's try to unravel the mystery of "Rabovitz Ukraine". I almost certainly assume that it means Grabivtzi / Hrabivtsi (Grabivtsy, Grabivti, Grabovtsy, Grabwitsch, Hrabovetz, Rabowetz) in former Transnistria. The "Ghetto List by ZRBG (German Social Security Ghetto Pension)".
http://ehpes.com/blog1/?p=10344
shows that there a ghetto / camp existed between 01.10.1941 - 31.03.1944. The list refers to the data of prominent historians Wolfgang Benz and Brigitte Mihok from 2009.
Grabivtzi / Hrabivtsi is located about 10 km east of Kopajhorod in Ukraine; there was a known ghetto there. I hope I could be helpful to you with these data.
Warmest wishes!
Edgar Hauster <iPhone>
Am 10.08.2021 um 02:23 schrieb Bruce Reisch <bruce.reisch_at_cornell.edu>:
Hi Adrienne,
I hope the collective knowledge of this group might be able to help you. For starters, though, you can find online the 1918 to 1928 birth records for Vashkivtsi:
https://www.familysearch.org/search/catalog/1461614?availability=Family%20History%20Library
You can view these records online with a free account on this site. I just had a look and they are quite neat and readable, handwritten in German or Romanian. If perhaps one of your grandfather’s siblings was born in this time period, you might find their record.
If any family vital records were recorded in Czernowitz, the data sources are much more complete:
Czernowitz.geneasearch.net
Similarly, you can find many of the records indexed on this site by looking for the corresponding record on the familysearch.org website.
Best wishes,
Bruce
From: bounce-125823473-3497436_at_list.cornell.edu <bounce-125823473-3497436_at_list.cornell.edu> on behalf of Adrienne Teicher <adrienne_at_freudianslit.com>
Date: Monday, August 9, 2021 at 19:56
To: CZERNOWITZ-L <CZERNOWITZ-L_at_list.cornell.edu>
Subject: [czernowitz-l] Looking for information on Mendel Teicher (born Mendel Elfenbein), my grandfather
Hi everyone,
My name is Adrienne Teicher. I’m an Australian living in Berlin Germany.
I’m reaching out for any help, any information, any illumination members of this list can provide about the experience of my grandfather Mendel Teicher. I’ll give a few key facts and then follow up with the questions that I have below.
He was born Mendel Elfenbein in Vășcăuți/Waschkautz/Vashkivtsi (around 15km east of Czernowitz) on 1st September 1909. His mother was Freda Elfenbein (nee Katz), born in 1882, his father was Joseph Elfenbein, born in 1880.
He married his first wife Berta Teicher on the 5th July 1939.
He emigrated some time in 1939, arriving in Melbourne, Australia on the SS MN Remo on the 26th September, 1939 (a ship he embarked in Naples).
After arriving, he secured permission to emigrate to Australia for his wife Berta and one of his sisters, but Berta died sometime before 1942 (I located her gravestone on JewishGen).
I will omit the rest of the details of his life in Australia because they are not so relevant to my questions, but I will say that he died in Melbourne on 10th October, 1987, when I was three years old.
My questions are as follows:
1) No-one in my family is clear why Mendel changed his surname from Elfenbein to Teicher. Does anyone know why he might have made this choice?
2) We have very little documentary evidence and I would love to find a birth or marriage certificate of my grandfather. Can anyone tell me how this might be possible? Any information about archival research would be appreciated.
3) My grandfather’s sister Dora Metsch filled out Yad Vashem forms for my great grandparents, Freda and Joseph Elfenbein. She lists their place of death as “Rabovitz Ukraine” in 1942 from “Cold & Hunger”. I can’t locate a place called Rabovitz, but my family understands that Dora was in a camp or facility somewhere with her parents when they died. Does anyone know where this Rabovitz is?
4) Another of my grandfather’s sisters Rika Pystiner was widowed early in the war (from what I can gather) and was then separated from the rest of her family and went to Zabolotiv with her daughter Fritzi Pystiner. Dora also filled out a Yad Vashem which states that they were “kilt” (killed) in Zabolotiv in 1942 – but gives no further information. I don’t know why they went to live in Zabolotiv, except that it is the town where my great grandfather Joseph Elfenbein was born, but perhaps it is because they were forcibly relocated to the ghetto there. I would love to learn more about them their lives and how they died but I don’t even know what questions to ask. Information is scarce, especially so for women and children, and it's very painful for me to think they were annihilated and that there is no trace of them at all.
Thanks for taking the time to read my email. I’m very appreciative of the people who make up this list and the stories and resources you all share. Looking forward to hearing from you.
Adrienne
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This moderated discussion group is for information exchange on the subject of
Czernowitz and Sadagora Jewish History and Genealogy. The opinions expressed
in these posts are the opinions of the original poster only and not necessarily
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Received on 2021-08-10 07:47:41