Soviet Jewish Oral History Project Western Reserve Historical Society Interviewee: Aron Levin Interviewer: Simon Rekhson Date of interview: December 20, 2013 Location of interview: 1221 Drury Court, Apt. 442, Mayfield Heights File WS310064 Simon Rekhson: Okay, today is December 20th, 2013. We are in Aron Levin’s apartment to conduct an interview for the Western Reserve Historical Society. About your life, Aron. Welcome! It’s a big honor and joy for me to interview you, but first we need to go over a few standard questions just for the record. So, could you please introduce yourself: what’s your name? Aron Levin: Aron Levin. I was born on January 1st in 1917. What else? SR: Where? AL: I was born in the village of Bervenovka, in the Gomel Region. This used to be Russia, and in about 1924, it became Belarus. We had to flee there from the thugs that ran this part of Gomel. And according to my passport, I was born in [the city of] Gomel. There was an external investigation there, because all of the documents had been lost along the way, and in my passport, it says that I was born January 1st, 1917, in the city of Gomel. SR: January 1st, 1917. The year of the revolution. AL: Yes. Well, at that time, our family was made up of nine people. Earlier, it used to be eleven, but two of them had already died—before the revolution, I think. So, in our family, we had five girls and two boys, including me. That is, five sisters and me. My father was a village Jewish schoolteacher; my mother, a housewife. SR: Aron, I want to come back to this a little bit later. All of this is very important and interesting. But first, just some quick information about you. So, now we know what your name is and when and where you were born. Now you live here, in Cleveland. Right? AL: Yes. SR: Just very briefly for now: tell us a bit about yourself! What jobs have you worked throughout your life? As I understand it, you’ve had a few professions. AL: So, what, tell you about my job? SR: Of course. For now, we’ll just briefly go over some information, and later, we’ll get into more detail. 1 AL: So I’ll start where? With moving to Moscow? SR: Your profession. These are just quick questions about your profession. You had several professions. Right? AL: Well, I’ll say this. You’re recording this. Yes? SR: We’re recording all the time. AL: Well, alright. Since our family was large and it lived poorly, I decided at thirteen years old to enroll in construction school. I graduated within two years, but I had to move to Moscow to earn a living. I came there at fifteen years old, and decided to go to work. My older sister, Rosa, lived there. Since nobody would hire me at fifteen years old, I went to the city of Moscow’s chief labor inspector on Neglinnaya Street, who gave me a work assignment at factory №67— Mastyazhart, as it used to be called. SR: Aron, you’re saying, “I went…I decided to go to work…” Did that really happen? A fifteen- year-old boy went by himself to Moscow? AL: Yes. SR: You stayed with relatives and went alone to find yourself a job? AL: Well, of course. SR: Sorry, what year was this? AL: 1932. SR: The year 1932. Okay, so… AL: In 1932, I came to Moscow. I didn’t work long at the factory, only half a year. All because, though this factory had a workforce of 40,000, that year there was a mass layoff of workers. They wanted to put me in a different department. At first, I worked as a statistician. They wanted to help me out, but I noticed that, across from the factory, there was a textile mill. I went there, added a year [to my age] (I didn’t have a passport yet). I added a year so they would hire me, and they admitted me into a work specialization of product sorting. I worked at that mill for three years. During that time, at first, I enrolled in a geodetic technical institute, in the evening program, to work and study at the same time. But this evening program closed only half a year later, and became just a daytime program. They transferred me to this daytime program, but I decided not to study in the daytime program, because I didn’t want to live dependent on my sister. I decided to work and enrolled in the “Rabfak,” (Workers’ Faculty, university for workers in the Soviet Union) in the evening program. SR: And how old were you when you made this decision? 2 AL: Well, I was 16, probably, or 17. It was a four-year school, but I finished these four years in two—because I enrolled in the second [term], but within a year transferred to the third term, and the fourth I already finished after leaving work. For the fourth term, I was already a student. I finished the Rabfak with honors, and immediately went with a group of friends to find a place to enroll and keep studying. SR: Now, Aron, the “Rabfak:” is that what the workers’ faculty was called? AL: Yes. SR: And after that, by and large, you were already ready to go to college. So this was a serious education—the “Rabfak?” AL: Secondary education. SR: That’s to say this was a full secondary education, and you completed it over two years. AL: Yes. I graduated with honors and I went to look for an institute. We went to a number of institutes, and settled on the HPI (the Historical-Philological Institute in Moscow), but then we found another institute. We took back our papers, went the law institute. It was called the Stuchko Institute of Government and Law then. There were thirteen applicants per spot there. I passed my exams with excellent scores. I’m saying it like it was. And so, I started studying in this institute. Studying was very interesting. SR: Let’s stop for a second. I want… File WS310065 SR: Let’s continue. AL: My classes at the institute were very interesting. There were world-renowned professors there. I listened to them carefully. But, unfortunately, after half a year of my studies at this institute, I was, as an active Komsomolets (youth branch of the Communist Party), drafted into the Moscow school for the NKVD (law enforcement agency of the Soviet Union). They explained, “Don’t you worry. You’ll be able to continue your law education there.” I studied at this school for one year. They sent me to work for the NKVD, in the department of state security. SR: And how can we spell out the NKVD? People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs? AL: Yes. After finishing this school, they sent me to Oryol. The Oryol Oblast, which contained 67 regions, had just been formed. That’s where they organized the regional state security administration. And so they sent me to work in this administration. I worked there doing—well, how can I put it—operative work. And during the war, I worked in the counterintelligence department. Once the war started, I was 24 years old. For the entire war, I worked in counterintelligence, where I combatted foreign intelligence services: Abwehr, the Gestapo, Karyuk (translator’s note: uncertain rendering of original), the Feldgendarmerie Polizei 3 (translator’s note: uncertain rendering of original), and other organizations. We waged a battle against all of these organizations. By the way, in one of the cities of Belarus, I think, there was a school organized by the Germans, a [military] intelligence school. We played a game with this school. A so-called “radio game.” At the very start of the war. SR: And what was the idea behind this game? AL: The thing is, they left their agents during the war. We flipped some of them, and with their help, we gave the information we needed to this military intelligence school. That is, we gave misinformation. And, at the same time, we also planted our own agents in this school. And so, later, along with the help of one of those who was thrown out [of a plane] with a parachute, we called for a [paratrooper] drop of Germans and took all of the parachuters captive (laughs). That was how things were. So, now, in the start of June 1941, I evacuated my family from Oryol to Siberia. First to Stalingrad, and then they moved to Siberia. SR: This was already after June 22, after the war started? AL: No, I moved them before that. SR: You moved them before? AL: No, it was during the war, after all, at the beginning. But I went on orders to the front lines of the war, where I had an assignment to help in an organization of partisan troops. I got in touch with the Party’s raikom (district committee) in Dyatkovo, with the headquarters of the 50th army, and started working. There in Dyatkovo, we blew up two factories. One was for crystal, the second was a machine works. Then, I helped send an echelon with bread behind our front lines. But at the time, the Germans had already occupied the village of Bytosh, where I was carrying out this work. The Germans took Bytosh. There was an enormous lake in Bytosh and it turned out that, on one side of the lake, there were already Germans who had broken through Desna, and we were on the other side of the lake.