Kiev – TRANS.HISTORY

(Wywiady dostępne są w językach angielskim i ukraińskim. Prosimy o wyrozumiałość.)

Kiev, Ukraine
Interview conducted in 2002 by Tatyana Chaika

My mother Shendel (Sophia) Smertenko. Photo made in 1920s in Kiev.

Haya-Ita Smertenko, my grandmother and my mother’s mother, and I. Photo made in 1938 in Kiev.

My father Aizik Lukatskiy perished in Deember 1941. Photo made in 1922 in Kiev.

Rosalia (Rachel) Smertenko, my aunt, my mother’s sister. Photo made in Kiev in 1915.

Max Smertenko, my Uncle, my mother’s brother and Ilia, his son, my cousin. Photo made in Kiev in 1910.

Ella Lukatskaya’s cousin Ilia Smertenko. This photos was taken in Waal

Ilia (Elchik) Shkolnik, my cousin, the son of Rosa, my mother’s sister, and Hanna, my cousin. Photo made in Kiev in 1919.

Born in 1938, Mrs. Lukatskaya was just a toddler when the Great Patriotic War broke out and only has dim memories of the period before the war. Her father was mobilized to the army on the first days of the war and she recalls that when he came to say good-bye to his family she was screaming and crying: “I loved my father dearly and I must have had an inkling that he was leaving forever.” Her father was a radio operator and perished in late 1941, while she, her mother and older sister left Kiev for Turkmenia (today Turkmenistan).

In vivid details the interviewee describes the harsh conditions at the collective farm, where they lived and worked. Upon the liberation of Kiev they returned home in spring 1944 and eked out a meager existence, her mother mending shabby clothes that they sold in exchange for food at the market. Upon graduation from Kiev Polytechnic University, Mrs. Lukatskaya worked as a radio engineer and teacher of information science, and founded a family. Her moving account is accompanied by 11 photos.

Learn more about Ella Lukatskaya here on the Centropa website.

(Wywiady dostępne są w językach angielskim i ukraińskim. Prosimy o wyrozumiałość.)

Kiev, Ukraine
Interview conducted in 2003 by Roman Lenhovskiy

My mother Rachil Risman with her fiance (name unknown) in Makarov in 1916.. My mother had this photo taken to send it to her brothers at the front.

These are my relatives on my mother’s side. From left to right: my grandmother Tsyvia Risman, grandfather Leizer Risman, my uncle (my mother’s brother) Ruvim Risman. Makarov, 1914.

My uncle (my mother’s brother) Moisey Risman. He sent this photo home to Makarov from the front during WWI, I don’t know from what location he sent it. Signed on the backside: 'To my dear mother, Father, Toiba, Ruvim and Rochel from their son and brother Moisey’.

From left to right (upper row): my mother Rachil Kotliar and her sister Tania (Toibl) Risman. Lower row: I with my brother Roman Kotliar. My mother had returned from hospital (she had breast cancer and had a surgery). We were having a stroll in a park and had this photo taken by a photographer in Kiev, 1927.

My brother Roman Kotliar – cadet of a military school in Ashkhabad. He sent this photo to his relatives in Denau. Ashkhabad, 1943.

This is a photo of me during my service in the army in Panevejis, 1941.. I was senior telephone operator of the training battery of an artillery regiment. I sent this photo home in Kiev.

This is a photo of me in an ostarbeiter camp in Germany. Stuttgart, spring 1944.

On the left is my friend Alexandr Pohitelyuk and me in Germany. After the Victory we worked at the Soviet car repair plant 'Porsche’. I sent this photo home signed on the backside: Here is a proof that I am alive. To my dear parents from their 'prodigal son’. Stuttgart, summer 1945.

The last peaceful summer of 1940 when I was staying in a children’s tuberculosis recreation center before the war. I am in the second row the second from the left; the fourth from the left – director of the recreation center Pyotr Mitselmakher, the first from the right is my future wife Ghita Kaplunovich.

On the left is my wife Ghita Kotliar holding our granddaughter Vlada Kotliar and me with our grandson Anton Kotliar. Vlada and Anton were spending their summer vacation with us and we were photographed in our yard. This picture was taken in Polesskoye, 1982.

This is my wife Ghita Kaplunovich with her parents: her mother Anna Kaplunovich, her father Avraam Kaplunovich. This photo was taken on Ghita’s 15th birthday. Kiev, 1937.

Leonid Kotliar’s wife Ghita’s grandfather Yakov Lopatnik

From the left on the foreground this is me with 8th grade pupils of secondary school #55 in Kiev. Kiev, 1961.

My brother Roman Kotliar, sent this letter from Ashkhabad to Denau where my father, Tania and Cecilia and Manya and Fania with their children were in evacuation. Letter dated 30 March 1943.

Certificate issued to me at the Soviet car repair plant in Germany. Stuttgart, 4.08.45: “Certificate. This is to certify that presenter of this Leonid Kotliar worked at the Russian car repair plant 'Porsche’ in the town of Stuttgart, from 6 May through 3 August 1945 as document control supervisor. Chief of car repair plant Rogovoy.”

In early 1945 my father stopped receiving letter from Roman from the front. At my father’s request commander of the military unit where my brother served sent him this certificate dated 8.02.46.

This is a photo of me near our house in Kiev. My wife photographed me and I sent this photo to my sister Cecilia in Israel. Kiev, 2003.

Wartime experiences prevail in Mr. Kotliar’s fascinating life story. Mobilized in July 1941, he was captured by the Germans in September of the same year and thus began his life as a prisoner-of-war. In haunting episodes, he described how fellow soldiers were giving away Jews, and how he worked as forced laborer in various places – from washing car wheels in a German military air force unit to being a night watchman in the bee garden of an old man and doing field work for almost a year. In October 1942, he was sent to Germany, where he became a so-called “OST-Arbeiter” (designation for slave workers gathered from Eastern Europe to do forced labor in Germany during World War II). Liberated near Stuttgart in April 1945, he worked at a Soviet car repair plant after the Victory, then served in the Soviet army in Germany. In the interim, his brother Roman fought in the 146th rifle battalion, was wounded in January 1945 and died on the way to hospital. Mr. Kotliar returned to the Soviet Union after he was demobilized in late 1946 and became a teacher of Russian language and literature. 17 photos accompany his story.

Learn more about Leonid Kotliar here on the Centropa website.