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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

TABLE OF CONTENTS ITEM TRANSCRIPT

ENGLISH TRANSLATION 2 CITATION & RIGHTS 16

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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

TRANSCRIPT ENGLISH TRANSLATION —Please state your name, place of birth, the names of your parents. Please go ahead.

I was born on July 17, 1923. I am eighty-four years old now. I was born in Minsk, where my parents had come to visit my father’s sister. We lived in the city of Novoborisov, Minsk Oblast. It is about 80 kilometers from Minsk. Until 1939, the state border lay not far from Minsk. We lived probably 60 kilometers from the Polish border. I was my parents’ firstborn. My mother, Revekka Moiseyevna, was a couple of years younger than my father. He worked as the manager of the Borisov branch of the State Bank, and my mother was a housewife. We were three children in the family: I was the eldest, then there was David and the youngest, Yakov. Three brothers. Our town was small. In the early 1930s, Soviet power had just taken root there. There were many children. The town was small, all the neighbors had children, all were friends. Our neighbors called us “three acrobat brothers—pitchfork, rake, and shovel." That's because we had a small vegetable garden, and as soon as we were old enough to hold garden tools, we spent much time in the garden, where we dug earth, planted, and played hide and seek. We were very close, and the neighbors came to visit often. Since there were many children, we got together, played soccer and various children’s games. I started school when I was about eight years old. First we went to a Jewish school, which, because of the small number of people who wanted to go there, was closed. I don’t remember what year it was, but my parents didn’t want us to go to a Jewish school. We were transferred to a Russian school, the Novoborisov Secondary School No. 6. The school was located in a very convenient and beautiful park, and we studied there. In 1941 we finished school. I say “we” because David and I took lessons together. As soon as I started school, he refused to stay at home and went with me, even though he was a year younger. In 1941 we finished tenth grade. On the night of June 22, we had our graduation dance. Since our school was mentored by the local military unit, there were many servicemen at the party. We did not know what was going on, but the military guys seemed anxious. In the morning after this ball, we all went swimming in the Berezina River, which flowed through our town. The Berezina is famous because of the 1812 battles with the French. There is a place in the town that we called “battery,” where French and then Russian troops had been deployed. Big guns stood there. The place is very beautiful—it is like a hill . . . Very beautiful. We loved promenading there with girls and just by ourselves. A very nice place. Our town was located near the Moscow-Minsk railway station. The station was called Novo-Borisov. The city of Borisov itself was located across the Berezina, 4-5 kilometers from the station. Actually, the place was inhabited by people of different ethnicities: there were Russians, Belarusians, Lithuanians, Poles, Jews, and we, the kids, were all friends. We were a close-knit group, played soccer and lapta [a game similar to baseball—Trans.]. And we also had students of different nationalities in our school.

On June 22, 1941, we settled on the banks of the Berezina and were going to take a swim. This was after the graduation ceremony. At about midday a few guys who remained in town came running and told us

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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN that the war had started: the Germans attacked Russia. In the fall of 1939 Germans occupied a part of Poland, while the Soviet Union took the piece of land called Western Belorussia. Many refugees arrived, some went to school with us, some got jobs.

—Were you surprised when they told you that the war had begun? What was your reaction?

The Soviet Union had been preparing for war. “Our tanks are fast, our tanks are strong” . . . The feeling that something was about to happen had been in the air for a while. Moreover, after the annexation . . . after the liberation of Western Belorussia [Belarus] in 1939, we felt that a war was coming, for the Soviet Union had moved very close to Germany. Germany occupied that part of Poland, and our army occupied almost the whole of Western Ukraine and Belarus. So war was in the air. All the boys were registered at the military recruitment offices. We had paramilitary training. Nobody evaded the army, we all trained for it, there was not a single guy who did not want to serve in the army. When we were informed about the start of the war, almost all the guys ran to the military recruitment office. Mobilization had already begun and there were crowds of people there. When we made our way to the military commission, those who were even a few months shy of eighteen were sent home. All seventeen-year-olds, including us, were all sent home so as not to get in the way. Naturally, we got together in the evening . . . Under the auspices of the police, detachments were formed to assist the local population and go on patrols. We organized a small detachment, which was supposed to prevent panic, while the military was coming from the west. That lasted until June 24-25. Refugees from Minsk began to arrive and report that Minsk had been bombed, that the Germans were very close. On June 26, the factory where my father worked—they manufactured plywood, matches, building materials—began evacuating. Factory equipment was dismantled and loaded on trains. Father ran home, we packed the essentials and went with this train. My youngest brother, Yasha, had left for Moscow a couple of hours earlier with our father’s relative. This relative had arranged with our father where they would meet. We evacuated on the 26th: Mom, Dad, David, and I. The railroad passed through Orsha. In Orsha we were heavily bombed. There were many burnt echelons there, and several bombs fell next to ours. Of course, we did not stay in the cars, we hid under them or in other places. A day or two later, what was left of the train moved forward. I remember we passed the city of Aleksandrov, Vladimir Oblast. Somewhere there, the train pulled into a siding and was unloaded; the passengers were loaded onto wagons and driven away. They brought us to some village, gave us a house. It was a residential place, but the owners were absent. A pretty big house, wooden floors, nice house. Mom and Dad began to settle in. We went to the village administration to assess the situation, and they offered us jobs, I can’t remember where. My father was an accountant, so they gave him a job at the administration. Mom did not work. She wrote letters to relatives who lived in Penza, Chelyabinsk, and Krasnoyarsk. After a while, a letter came from Penza from my mom’s sister inviting us to come there. During the war one couldn’t just move at will, one needed permission and an invitation to relocate. So we left for Penza. I can’t tell you now when exactly this happened. I think it was in the fall. We arrived and settled in. Dad got a job, my brother and I wanted to study further. There were no other higher education establishments in Penza at the time except for a construction college and a pedagogical institute.

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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

—And your youngest brother?

No news from the youngest brother; he just left. While we were settling in, our father and mother were looking for Yasha. Dad knew where his relative was going to land, he wrote there, but no response came. My father was a religious man, and he immediately went to the local synagogue in Penza and told them about his son. Some time later, one of the worshipers said that he had seen a boy who said that his aunt lived in Penza. And some time later, we found Yasha. David did not want to study, so he started looking for a job.

—And your father wasn’t afraid to go to the synagogue, to pray?

He was fervently religious. He attended a synagogue in Borisov, too. It was not forbidden then. It was another matter if a person had an official post, then he could not go to the synagogue. The elderly went to the synagogue, that was part of their lives. These were not the synagogues of today or of the olden days before the Revolution: they were prayer houses. But Penza boasted a real synagogue. There were few Jews there, but there was a synagogue. And perhaps there was less persecution in Penza at the time. We stayed with our relatives. My aunt’s name was Esya—Esfir [Esther]. Her maiden name was Elkind, and her husband’s name was Solomon Genkin. Solomon had no children, it was just the two of them, until my aunts came to stay from Leningrad [St. Petersburg]. One aunt soon died. We all settled with Esya. After a while, Yasha showed up. Yasha immediately went to study at a vocational training school. David got a job at a bicycle factory, which later became a military plant. The bicycle factory named after Frunze. I wanted to study and enrolled at the construction college, but it did not give me what I wanted. It was summertime and I left. Just then, I got a job at the plant recently evacuated from Sumy. The machine tools stood right in the open air, exposed to the elements. Electricity was brought to them. When I came to the factory, the roof had already been constructed. I was trained and started working as a turner. The plant began to manufacture military ware.

—Was it in 1941?

It was the fall of 1941. By the winter of 1941, the plant had already been constructed, and we worked in workshops. After a while, I got my qualification and began to help tune the machines. I was offered a job as master in a lathe shop. I refused because I didn’t have it in me to command people, to take responsibility for them. Moreover, I enjoyed my job and was good at it.

I declined the post in the fall and was called up in December. My worker’s exemption was removed, and by the end of 1941, I joined the army. We received training for the first couple of months and went to the front in early spring. We were brought north of Moscow, to the Western Front. If I remember correctly, the village where they brought us and where we started the war was called Redkino, Kalinin [Tver] Oblast.

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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

—What was your rank at the start of the war?

Sergeant. First, junior sergeant and then sergeant. I was given command of a squad after training, and we went to the front. We got there just after the Germans had been defeated near Moscow.

—What type of forces were you in?

Infantry. I was given a rifle, awarded a rank, and given command of a squad. For about a month, we trained. There I received the baptism by fire. It is rather difficult to describe, because so much time has passed since. I remember that we immediately ended up in the trenches. It was early spring, the ground was still covered in ice at the bottom, but it had already thawed above, so it was rather muddy. We fought in local skirmishes first and then went on the offensive. Naturally, many were wounded and killed, but we were advancing. At some point, we were taken to the rear, reinforced, and continued to move west of Moscow. We passed Rzhev; it had already been liberated. And then the fighting began, followed by withdrawal to the rear, regrouping, and return to the front line. We knew that we should move forward. Of course, people fell, we saw the wounded, we saw the dead, but we had to advance. We did not feel scared. No. When we moved forward, we knew that we were beating the Germans. When we would halt and had to retreat, we tried to hang back somewhere. I had eleven people in my squad. In the first battles we lost two: one wounded and one killed. Of course, it was very hard. Very hard. Then, we were thrown into battle, then withdrawn to the second line for reinforcement. We were constantly on the move. The hardest battle that I remember took place west of Rzhev, where I lost six people wounded and dead from my squad. I don’t know exactly who was wounded and who was dead, but the wounded did not return. In 1943, we were liberating cities in Smolensk Oblast. I remember one battle for either the village or town of Spas-Demensk. We were not in the actual town, somewhere in the vicinity. There are many forests and fields there. The battles took place mainly in the fields, because the partisans were operating from the forests, and they kind of cleared the way for us. In one of these battles I was wounded in my right arm. The injury was such that my fingers stopped moving. I was sent to the rear by a medical train. We were moving past Penza, and I asked the hospital command to drop me off in Penza. I spent a month in a hospital there, undergoing physiotherapy for my fingers. Then, in the fall of 1943, I was transferred to a reserve regiment, which was being trained for the front. I was surrounded by my family when I was at the hospital, so everything was fine. There was a place near Penza where reserve troops were assembled. I stayed there for about two months. It was spring already, and we were preparing to be sent to the front. We formed a line, the commander stepped out and ordered everyone who had graduated tenth grade to come forward. Of the fifty people, about fifteen stepped out. The taller ones were returned to the ranks, and the shorter ones were offered to study at a tank school. It was the year 1943. We didn’t even know where we were being sent. In the meantime, they directed us to the Penza recruitment office, where a military unit was stationed. From there we were sent somewhere in Penza Oblast for harvesting. It was 1943. We learned to operate harvesters and tractors. I worked a harvester; we harvested wheat. This was August, and in early September we were reassembled in our unit. People had been sent to different kolkhozes; four had been

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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN working at ours. We were sent to Sverdlovsk [Yekaterinburg] to a tank school. We spent New Year's in Sverdlovsk, received our tanks, and took them to the front. We trained for about four or five months. We went to the front, disembarked near Polotsk [Polatsk], and a week later went into battle. At the tank school I received the rank of sergeant-tank commander. My position was in the turret, I was in charge of the loader and had to shoot. We went into battle near Polotsk in the spring. In one of the battles in April, our tank was fired at and its side armor was pierced. We somehow got out. The tank was on fire. I had a short stint at the hospital for about two weeks. I was burned and blinded. There were three of us in the tank: me (the tank commander), a loader, and a driver. We pulled the driver through the escape hatch from the underside. Everyone survived. My eyes were damaged and treated at the hospital. The driver was sent to the rear, because the back of his head was burned. The loader was also wounded. After the hospital, I couldn’t get into a tank unit, because my vision had been compromised. An infantry unit was formed and sent to Vilnius. Near Vilnius, we went into battle, but I wouldn’t say that we actually fought—there was very little fighting. We were on the march, a very difficult one. Firstly, we marched at night; and secondly, it was spring, so we carried all the ammunition on top of our winter outfits. We approached Riga in early March. We halted, some of us were sent to Riga to quash the looting campaign that had began there. I was commander of a machine gun squad. Our squad was also sent there, but thankfully, we did not participate in the battle. It’s a terrible thing to shoot at your own . . . After Riga had been been taken, we were sent to a small town near the bay. We fought there almost till the end of the war. There I was wounded when a fragmentation shell exploded in our trench. This happened on March 5, 1945.

—What year was it?

1945. The shell exploded, I was wounded in the leg, one or two guys were killed. I was pulled out of the trench. A cart which collected the wounded was driving past. I couldn’t walk. I was picked up and taken to the rear. They picked me up, I lost consciousness and found myself in a field hospital. There was a tent with bunks, and someone was doing something to my leg. I was carried into the operating room, where three doctors debated whether to chop the leg off or not . . . They did something, I don’t know because I was anesthetized. I woke up already in a cast. It was in Krustpils, a small town in Latvia. How I got there, I don’t know. I found myself in a school hall. There were a lot of cots, many wounded, moaning and crying . . . I was in a cast, with 38-degree fever. I felt thirsty but they wouldn’t let me drink. A nurse sat next to me, calming me down.

—Why wouldn’t they let you drink?

You see, one shouldn't drink with such injuries. They would wet my lips and that was all. The nurse sits there, makes reassuring noises. An Uzbek groans next to me, something is wrong with his legs and his arm, too. After a while I began to look around. Next to me on the other side too . . . A few days later, I noticed that the Uzbek was gone. I asked, “Has he been evacuated?” And the nurse replied, “Yes, to the afterlife.” I

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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN spent three weeks in that hospital. People are being evacuated, and I’m just lying there. My fever holds. The nurse was Russian. We started chatting: “When your fever subsides, you’ll go, too.” It was a huge hall, about forty people, groans all around. And I began to cheat: before handing her a thermometer, I would shake it down a little. And they evacuated me, put me in a rail car. And my temperature began to rise. We crossed the border. I remember how one of the wounded shouted that finally we were in Russia. My temperature rose to 40C. The medical train had doctors on board. They administered sulfidine and streptocid drugs to bring my fever down. So, we got to Kotelnich in Kirov Oblast, disembarked. In the hospital a hole was cut out in my cast and the leg cleaned up. On the night of May 9—a loudspeaker was nearby—the end of the war was announced. Immediately people began to get up, there was such a clamor. Sometime later I was also propped up. I couldn’t stand, because my head was spinning, so I nearly fell. A nurse caught me. I was in plaster up to here. After a while they took off this part, propped me up, and I could move around the ward on crutches but still with the cast on. It was tough, but still. I started going outside. The doctor who supervised me said, “You must step on the foot.” So I did. They removed the rest of the cast, and I gradually started walking. I started walking. It was spring, the beginning of summer. There was a grassy patch of land near the school. We went out on the lawn some people lay there, some sat and watched life go on in Kotelnich. It was deep in the rear. We noticed that there were a lot of pregnant women . . . One could feel it was the end of the war. Naturally, we discussed what we would do in peacetime. I don’t remember the exact date when I left the hospital. I don’t remember. In any case, I was discharged from the hospital, took off the cast, and began to walk on crutches. The hospital sent a nurse with me to bring me home. I don’t remember now how we traveled. I remember that there were a lot of wounded on the train who were returning from hospitals. I remember that we came to Arzamas and changed trains. The transfer took a toll on the nurse, because she had too many wounded and disabled in her charge. I had to buy a ticket, even though my papers said that I was disabled . . . Long story short, we arrived in Penza. The nurse passed me to my parents, and I began life in Penza.

I acquired friends and the ability to walk. Once, I came to the factory I used to work at. Almost no one remained of the people I used to work with at the workshop. I went to the technical bureau, where I had acquaintances and colleagues, and was told, especially by one colleague, to go to a university in Moscow or Leningrad. She said, “Apply to Moscow Higher Technical School” (MVTU). I began to prepare for exams. My acquaintances from Penza helped with my preparations. I sent applications to three places: Leningrad Mining Institute, Moscow Instrument Engineering Institute, and the Higher Technical School. My cousins lived in Leningrad [St. Petersburg]. One of them graduated from the Mining Institute and worked in his field: he was building the metro. When my elder cousin learned that I had applied to the Mining Institute, he wrote me a letter: “Are you crazy to go to the Mining Institute in your condition?” Right then, an invitation came from the Mining Institute, with the proviso that I pass a medical exam. An invitation also came from MVTU, and I went there. There I had a single exam in math . . . And, also, the Russian language. Two exams. I did not have to pass a foreign language exam. I told them bluntly, “I don’t know English, and I hate German.” When they asked me what I wanted to study and I said mechanics and technology, there

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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

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ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN was no more fuss. I was accepted and given a stipend. I was given a room in a student dormitory. Do you know where Baumanskaya metro station is? The school was located at 2nd Baumanskaya Street, and our dormitory was in Brigadirsky Lane. I was given a room on the second floor. There were five disabled veterans in the room. Four had just arrived and one who had enrolled a year before. We began to study. Of course, there were a lot of disabled veterans at MVTU. There was even a committee of war veterans there.

—Were you treated with respect, as participants in the war . . .

Of course. Firstly, only war veterans were accommodated in the dormitory. There were three disabled people in our room. One was a year ahead of us, Kolya Torbin; one had a leg injury too—his leg wouldn’t bend; two were also disabled, but their limbs worked fine. One of them had a gash under a shoulder blade, but it had healed. In the next room lived someone who was not disabled but was a Hero of the Soviet Union. They had five people to a room and we had five, too. This was an excellent dormitory, specially built by a tsarist nobleman. Razumovsky built the school and the hostel. Actually, there were supposed to be four people to a room but we had five. There were tables, chairs—the full set. The dormitory was very good. And the school was located just across the street. There were many disabled at the school. Of course, we had a special committee set up that dealt with festivities, assistance, and additional meals. A canteen was situated on the first floor of the dorm. War veterans had everything. They were covered. We did not feel any discrimination. So I studied for five years. I passed all my exams, put together projects, and participated in the choir. We were conducted by Boris Osipovich Dunaevsky, Isaac Osipovich’s brother. I never gave a photo of the choir to anyone, even though they asked me. I have an album with many photos of the choir. At that time, photos were not as common. Someone was invited with a big camera. I wouldn’t say that I was an excellent student. In subjects such as hydraulics, mathematics, I had an average grade, no better no worse than others. I defended my diploma with honors, and had a choice of jobs after graduation. They offered me to work in Moscow, but I refused. Firstly, where would I have stayed? From the first days of the war, I had no fixed abode, moving around dorms and rented rooms. I didn’t want to wait for a possible flat in Moscow . . . I didn’t want to stay in Moscow. When I was offered a choice—Novosibirsk, Yurga, Saratov—I chose Saratov. First, it was close to Penza, right in the center of Russia, and there was a new plant under construction. After the holiday, which lasted a month . . . We were handed our diplomas in July, and I went to Penza. While working on my diploma, during the winter holidays in Penza, I met a girl who later became my wife. She also fought, went with her unit from Kharkov [Kharkiv] to Stalingrad [Volgograd], participated in battles. She was in a field hospital, that is, in the hospital, which receives the wounded straight from the battlefield.

—What is her name?

In Russian Tatyana, Taibl in Hebrew. She did not like that name very much. When I asked her once, she said, “What do you need it for?” She took courses at the Kharkov Chemical Institute before the war. There

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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

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ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN she was called Tanya, and so she became Tatyana.

—How were women treated at the front?

Who do you think fed us? When we were withdrawn to the second line for reinforcement, 10 kilometers from the front line, there were women there, very good-looking women, young, had just finished school. Of course, we were interested, would get acquainted, asked their names . . . But none of that . . . Firstly, I was too young then, wasn’t driven that much. And then I met this woman who immediately understood me. And when I arrived home after defending my diploma, my mom already knew her, and she . . . reintroduced us. We had known each other before but were not in a relationship. When I was on vacation before graduation, we met, and after my viva, we got to know one another properly. She graduated from the Kharkov Economic Institute and received a referral to Penza, working at the Penza watch factory named after Frunze. When I returned having defended my diploma, we had already been introduced. We began going out, chat about our front-line experiences. She fought from Kharkov to Stalingrad. The field hospital is the first to receive the wounded. She was in the hospital administration, participated in battles. She has a medal “For Battle Merit.” I also got one for Latvia, but it was stolen when I was unconscious on the transport. Only the military ID remained. All the documents, all the photos . . . Only one small photograph remained from the times I was a tankman. Some things got replaced: all the injury certificates.

—Tell us about your medals.

I had a medal “For Battle Merit.” I’m wearing Tanya’s now—I had exactly the same one. And here is what I received after the war: Order of the Patriotic War, this medal was awarded by Grechko. I do not remove it from this jacket, because there is a hole. Previously, I had one medal on my tunic. I tried to get it replaced, but only have the award certificate, that is my military ID—it’s all in there.

—Did you get sick while at the front?

Considering the conditions we were in, surprisingly, no one got sick, as if the entire body was mobilized. Near Riga we practically slept in water, because it was impossible to dig a trench without the water seeping in immediately. We were amazed at how trees grew on the Courland peninsula—a shell hits a tree and the tree itself falls from the root together with the fragments, although the blow came somewhere above. Our overcoats were perpetually damp. It was the beginning of spring, so rain followed snow. I used to dream about it all, but I haven’t had dreams about the war for fifteen years. When I came to America, for the first few weeks I had these front-line dreams.

—What was the food situation like in 1942?

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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

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ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

It was dreadful. If the field mess managed to get through, we had a hot meal. Otherwise, we ate dried bread biscuits. Bread is impossible to preserve, so we made rusks.

—Did the situation improve in 1944?

In 1944, I was in a tank unit, where we received good rations. We had room in our tank and would load everything we needed. We ate well. It was dry rations, but we ate well.

—Can you talk more about life in the evacuation?

Everything was rationed. It was enough for a day. In Penza, one could get anything at the market. It was expensive but available. By the end of the war, when our army began to advance, it became easier. One could get more with ration cards, and in general, life became better, according to my parents.

—You said that before the war you were taught that our tanks were fast . . . Was there a moment at the beginning of the war when it seemed impossible to defeat the Germans?

No, there never was. Never. There was the sense that . . . not quite that we would lure them in and then defeat them . . . We retreated, preserving our troops. We lost fewer people while retreating. Attacking units lost more men. We retreated to save lives. In general, offensive armies lose more men. Many had been captured at the very beginning of the war. There were several reasons for that: first, all the troops were concentrated in Belarus, many men, but they were not preparing for war; second, the surprise attack, which resulted in the capture of all our troops. Look what happened in Brest. We visited Brest in 1975. Those who remained there could not understand what was going on . . . the troops were not ready. The Germans attacked suddenly. The command was apparently at a loss. After all, we had been proclaiming that we were prepared for the eventuality of war: “if war comes tomorrow.” And then nothing . . . The Germans immediately overran our main positions . . . We had a feeling that our leadership had missed it. We lived in Novoborisov. And about 10 kilometers away, there was a troop compound, called Pechi. They had a cavalry unit, a tank unit, an infantry unit—it was huge. When the war began, we could not understand why they wouldn’t move forward, why they just sat there. And they were first to be bombed. The Germans knew everything, even though everything had been secret.

—When did you learn about the extermination of Jews by the Germans?

Jews . . . We learned later, already in Penza. We arrived in Penza in October-November. There, we found out from the radio broadcasts.

—Did this influence you in battle?

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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

Most certainly . . . We tried . . . prepared, if you were a Jew . . . We had Jews in our unit . . . There was another Jew besides me in our unit. I had Tajiks, Turkmen, Uzbeks, Russians, and Jews, too. I had eleven people in my squad. There was one Uzbek whom I just could not get to; he just couldn’t understand anything. There was a Tajik who helped me a great deal. There was another Tajik, but he was killed in the first battle. There were Belarusians, Russians. Our company commander was a Jew. My platoon commander was Russian. My mother remembered so well . . . I used to write about them in my letters.

—Letters to parents?

Yes, I wrote from the front. One of my commanders was on a work trip in Penza, so he came to see them.

—What was the relationship like between different nationalities?

There was great rapport in my squad; except, the Uzbek was treated badly. He was mocked because he was, well, that type, a boor, really. There was the Tajik, he was a great guy, took care of me, made good suggestions. In the last battle I commanded, he filled in for me. But the Uzbeks, the Turkmen—these were not good. Especially the Uzbeks. There were mostly Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, and two Jews.

—Were there any manifestations of anti-Semitism from the commanding officers?

The platoon commander Skrylnik treated everyone very well. I can’t remember the attitude of the battalion commander, and we saw the regiment commander only once.

—Do you have any painful memories?

The most painful thing was the death of our men. The most painful thing was when the guys from our squad got killed, when someone dies from the explosion or shells fragments in front of you. When I first got here, I used to dream about it all. Why here? I can not understand. In Saratov, I stopped having these dreams after ten or fifteen years. For some reason, here, on several occasions I dreamt of the front line, my comrades, the guys from the squad, myself on a tank, and the moment when we pulled ourselves out. Somehow you get used to war, yes, you get used to it. I arrived in Saratov after graduation, and literally a week later I felt at home there. By the way, the plant in Saratov began functioning practically at the same time when we got there. When I arrived, there was only one operational workshop, where equipment was being assembled for other workshops. There were approximately five hundred workers in the entire plant. It was 1951. Already in 1952 workers began arriving from other places. There were already several thousand. All young men, seventeen- and eighteen-year-olds. The plant began manufacturing goods. Initially, we had German, Hungarian machines acquired as reparations. Light bulbs, ordinary light bulbs . . . The equipment arrived and our task was to assemble it and design new machines. Moscow Electric Lamp Plant sent us blueprints, which we then adapted to our needs and produced equipment for factories in

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Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

Saransk, Alma-Ata [Almaty]—the assembly lines for the production of light bulbs, of which there was a great shortage. Later our plant became an electronic engineering one.

—During the war, did you feel the help of America and other countries?

Only in the final years did we feel American help, when we began receiving Studebaker trucks and military rations, like spam. At the front, when these cans appeared, we did not throw them away; instead, we stored them and, whenever we had some free time, we made document holders out of them. This worked well. We got canned food, we got spam, also rain capes. The infantry received very little besides food. Tankmen received nothing, only domestically produced goods. Even the sights might have been designed in America but were made in the Soviet Union. Some received some kinds of American equipment. Most US goods went to the air force . . . The Ukrainian fronts, the Belorussian fronts . . . the southern ones got something from the US. On our 2nd Belorussian Front, where I was in a tank unit, I don’t remember getting anything. Perhaps the military command received stuff.

—The world has changed since then?

The world has changed a lot. Civilized countries have forgotten that there are countries that are far from civilized. Besides Europe and America, there is also Asia, which is inhabited by very ancient peoples. I don’t mean China, with its own culture and traditions. Better not to mess with them. But they forgot that there is the Middle East with its tough religion, Islam. When one reads the Torah—I first began to read it here in Russian—it says everything began with Ismail hating his brother. After all, they were brothers, with different mothers but the same father. One began to help people, do something, study, while the other went into trading. That’s where it all began. But I became interested in religion here. In the Soviet Union I was not into religion, had no time for it. I was not a party member either. My wife was a party member, became otherwise she could not succeed in her career. She became a party member at the watch factory when she arrived there, because it was impossible to advance there without being a party member.

—You haven’t said anything about your brothers.

We were three brothers. I was the eldest, then David, and Yakov the youngest. David was a year younger than me, so we were very close. Though David was probably even closer to Yasha than me. They had a two-year difference in age. I was born on July 23, David was born on September 24, and Yasha was born on October 26. David was always with me. I went to school, initially to a Jewish one, and he made such a fuss about wanting to go, too. Maybe because of him we left the Jewish school for a Russian one. He didn't like it there. When I transferred to the Russian school, he did also. We studied together, took our exams together, and graduated together. He was a better student than me. I lagged behind in Russian and

Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

Belarusian. But I was better at math and physics. He was the first to go to the front. He worked at the Frunze Plant in Penza. They produced air-defense equipment. Then the production was closed down and in 1942, they switched to something else. He volunteered for the army then. Letters came from him from the southern regions. The last letter I remember was from somewhere in the vicinity of Orel. I had a cousin older than us. Also David Pliss, he was six years older than me. He was, too, at the front in the south of Ukraine. He was in engineering forces, while David was a sapper, and they met somewhere there. He wrote to his parents that he had seen David there. David fought on the Southern Front, somewhere south of Poltava, and was killed there. The death notice came from there. He was a sapper. He wrote his letters in pencil. I have one of his letters; gave it to my son Borya. What can I say about him? Only what happened before the war and during the first year of the war. We loved each other, took care of each other, we were together all the time. Of course, I celebrate all his birthdays. How else? I have only one small photograph where we are playing chess. It's of very bad quality. When was it? In 1940, before the war, a very long time ago. Now the younger brother, Yasha, was a special person. First of all, when he arrived in Penza, he immediately went to a vocational training school, that trained assistant engine drivers. He graduated and became an assistant engine driver and worked on the railway, driving freight trains. In 1943, he volunteered for the army. After the news of David’s death, he joined the army. He was not yet eighteen then, having been born in 1926. This was in 1943. Since he was tall, he was immediately sent to a naval school. He graduated from this school and was sent to the Far East in 1944. Their base was located on Russky island. He sent letters from there. He informed us that he was sweeping for mines on a small Sea Hunter guard ship. He fought against the Japanese. He served there until 1951. In 1951 he was demobilized and went to Minsk, where he had a fiancée. They had met in Orsha. This is also part of our story, when in 1937 my father was arrested, but was released, and we had to go to Orsha, where he got a job. This was in 1937-38.

—What did they want him for?

He was a Jew, a chief accountant, a bank manager . . . That’s how it was then in 1937. It was terrible. Our neighbor vanished one day, acquaintances disappeared. It was horrible.

—He was released, but did it affect you?

We were not affected in any way. Many people stood up for him. We had a neighbor, a fireman, a Bolshevik, a partisan. He was a Belarusian, uncle Mitya Golyshev. His son Kostik was my friend. Kostya fought all the way to Konigsberg [Kaliningrad], where he celebrated victory. Kostik served on the southernmost borders of the USSR.

—So you went to Orsha . . .

We didn’t stay long in Orsha. We were given part of a house, and continued to live and study there. There,

Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

I first became involved in photography. David was less patient in that respect. Unfortunately, those pictures that were taken in Orsha were on glass plates . . . Then we returned to Borisov. My grandmother had died, so the house stood empty. We came back to Borisov and lived in the house until the war started. David took a big part in photography. Unfortunately, almost all the photos were lost; we didn't manage to take them . . . When we arrived in Penza, there was no camera so . . . In Penza, our aunt gifted us a camera called “Moscow.” At the same time, one couldn’t just hand in a film or a plate for development; you had to do it yourself. And I had a job, working twelve hours a day, with only one day off. So, there was no picture taking in Penza. After the war, when I began to study, I was gifted a “Moscow.”

—Did your parents speak Yiddish at home?

At home, when parents didn’t want us overhearing, they would speak Yiddish. Grandma also spoke Russian, Belarusian, and very good Yiddish. But we began to understand, and it was difficult to hide something from us. But we did not speak Yiddish and I regret it now. We lived next to Belarusians, Russians, Poles, Latvians, Ukrainians. We even learned some Roma. There were many gypsy encampments nearby, and we made friends with them. I can still understand some Belarusian. We also understood Lithuanian and Polish.

— Do you remember any front-line jokes?

No . . . I can't remember now . . .

—Have I forgotten to ask you anything?

I don’t think so.

—Thank you so very much!

I never told this to anyone. I was once interviewed at the factory where I worked. It was Victory Day, local newspapers printed stuff. Sometimes I could get a paper . . . The thing is, you don’t always want to remember. As soon as you talk about the front, it is more often very unpleasant to remember how people were killed in front of you . . . Some things are so frightening to talk about, it is better to remember good things. I understand that this is for our children. When we were still in Russia, I realized that I knew so little about my ancestors. I have compiled a list of all who came before me, but it turns out there is no one to ask. No one . . .

—Little information has been collected about Jewish front-line soldiers.

Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

You are absolutely right. At the front there were those who went: "Oh, the Jews . . ." They told jokes. And then someone would say, "Listen, the commander is a Jew." And they would stop short. And I would say, "Let him tell the joke, if he wants to. And I can tell you about a Russian, how he is lying in a swamp." Still, I had a great squad, we cared about one another. Treated one another with respect. I haven't told you about my factory . . . I received a job assignment in 1951, was sent to a plant in Saratov, called Electronic Engineering Plant. The plant had just became operational. When I arrived, the plant was producing and installing equipment in other workshops. Gradually lathes began to arrive . . . The main building had been built by the Germans, and when I came to the factory, several German specialists still worked there. I was sent to the design office . . . My boss was an engineer who had arrived a year earlier, Ilya Ruvimovich Zaltsman. He became my teacher. The lathes came as reparations from Germany. Gradually, engineers who graduated from universities began to come to us . . . also, young specialists who graduated from vocational schools, factory training schools. Workshops were opened . . . They made lathes for manufacturing electronic goods . . . After three or four years, the factory became well-known throughout the country. Foreign delegations came . . . They learned from us . . . The equipment became more and more complex and went for export . . . I first worked at our factory as a designer . . . then became head of the design department . . . The plant does not exist anymore, it is a warehouse now . . . The only thing we did not produce was military materiel . . . Maybe there were military workshops there, but we didn’t know about them . . . I was glad that I did not participate in the production of the military equipment . . . Those who did, they were not allowed to emigrate. Five or six years had to pass for one to be able to leave . . .

Moisey Pliss. Full, unedited interview, 2007

ID NY028.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b4028pf57

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

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