Shalom Schnall's story as remembered by Paul Schnall.

I'll try and keep it in chronological order. Shalom was born in Dec 12th 1919 in Tarnabjek, Poland to a farming family. His family was Chasidish (This is my opinion he never said that specifically, I am coming to this conclusion from snippets of conversations.). He grew up on a potato farm upon which was a farmers market run by his mother that generated income for the family. One of his first memories was as a young child he was sitting in the yard with a bunch of baby chicks and he was having a grand old time grabbing them and throwing them. Needless to say his mother would not be happy to find a bunch of dead chicks in the yard. His sister Shirley saw what was going on and (I don't know the details) she somehow fixed the situation so that Shalom was not punished. In 1932 our grandfather Shalom's father Yitzchak passed away. I do not know how old he was but I do know that Aunt Gert was born in 1900 my guess is that Yitzchak was probably around 20 years old at the time of his marriage. That would bring his birth-date to ~1879. Yitzchak died in 1932. I know this because he died the same year that Shalom had his bar mitzvah. Shalom inherited Yitzchak's set of tephilin in 1932 and started to wear them before his actual bar mitzvah to say Kadish. Growing up Shalom went to cheder. This was a small school with a Jewish Chareidi teacher. Dad told us a story that when he was in school the teacher would enter the class, place his black hat on the table, sit down and start teaching. Unfortunately, he would place his his hat brim side up as he put it down. One day Dad or one of his fellow classmates (I am not sure it was dad or not) poured ink into the hat. At the end of class the teacher discovered the ink the hard way.

Start of WWII

There were 10 siblings in the family. Gert (Gittle), Neche, Golda, Moshe, Shirly (Shaindel), Betty (Bracha), Sol (Shlomo,) Sam (Shalom), Chaya, and Rivka. This is not the birth order. Gert, Shirley and Betty came to America before WWII. I think that Neche, Moshe, Rivka, and Golda, were married with children before WWII started. As far asI know Neche, Moshe, Rivka, and Golda, all died with their families during the war. I a;so think that Rivka died in Auswitz. Neche was married to a Colonel in the Polish Army and he and the whole family were shot by German soldiers on the road. Sol, Shalom, Chaya and their mother Ratza (Rosalie) traveled east in 1939 in order to cross the border from Poland into Russia. Sam told us a story that the four of them were traveling in a horse and wagon, when they were approached by a single German soldier walking down the road. The soldier ordered them off of the wagon, but my dad refused to get down knowing that without the wagon they would all die. Luckily the soldier did not shoot them but let them all go with their wagon. Upon crossing into Russia they were summarily arrested and put into jail. The conditions were overcrowded without even enough room for everyone to lay down on the floor. After days in jail they jailor came and asked everyone to become Russian citizens. The Schnalls did not agree to become ussian citizens and after 18 days in jail they were put onto a train (cattle car) and sent to Siberia.

Siberia

At the end of the train ride (days if not weeks) the doors to the train opened and there they found nothing in front of them but a forest. They disembarked and were told that they better start building barracks if they wanted to survive the winter. They built two barracks. Each one had a single wood burning stove in the center. One night it was getting very cold but no one wanted to go out and chop wood. My dad went out into the night and luckily there was a full moon. He chopped a whole bunch of wood and started feeding the stove, until it was so hot that people were complaining. This is where they met the rabbi from Toronto. Aunt Chaya, grandma Ratza, Sol and my dad kept an eye on him as his bourgeoisie parents could not survive without their help. Dad told us after the start of winter a young girl died from the miserable conditions. When they went to bury her, the snow was too deep and the ground too frozen. They had to put her body outside in a place protected from the animals and keep her frozen until the spring. After the ground thawed out they were able to bury her. My dad and I think his uncle (maybe someone else in the family can tell me exactly who this was) were out in the winter trying to find some food when they came across a deer. They tracked this deer for more than a day until it collapsed from exhaustion and then they were able to kill it and bring it back for everyone to share. Their job in Siberia was to cut trees. Every day they would go into the forest and cut down trees with hand tools, axes and saws. At the end of the day some Russian soldiers would arrive with dinner. CORN. Every day corn for a whole year. When my dad finally made it the US he never ate corn again. In the winter they would go out to cut trees and then when the spring thaw came they would see the trees they cut were all cut at different heights. This was due to the fact that there was varying depths of snow every day and by the end of winter they were cutting trees 3 meters off of the ground due to the depth of the snow laying on the ground.

Uzbekistan

After a year in Siberia the Polish citizens were told that the Polish government wanted to put together an army to try and push the Germans out of Poland. The idea was that Polish citizens would be sent to Uzbekistan and there they would form an army. All Polish citizens interested in going to Uzbekistan could get on a train and relocate. My dad along with Chaya, Sol, and Ratza got on the train with one suitcase between them containing all of their belongings. The train was filled to capacity and then some, there was no room even to find a seat and it was not possible to move between cars. After a while my dad noticed that their suitcase was missing and started looking for it. As he could not move through the train he decide to go on top and walk along the roofs of the moving cars to move from car to car and search for his suitcase. Moving along the the train this way he was able to search all of the cars until he found and retrieved the suitcase. Upon reaching Uzbekistan, everyone disembarked and people started searching for places to live (this part of the story is better related by Rabbi Marmur). He tells about finding a place where the Schnalls, the Marmurs, and a few other families shared. Dov relates his side of the story. I do not think he is very appreciative of the fact that the Schnalls out of the kindness of their hearts and Jewish upbringing probably saved him and his family from dying both in Siberia and Uzbekistan. Especially when he implies that aunt Chaya was less than honest and less than moral. After a while Sol and Sam got jobs together digging trenches for underground electric lines. I think this must have been in Tashkent. He and Sol lived in the city and Chaya and Ratza lived in the country. One day Dad and Sol got a message that Ratza was deathly ill. Dad was looking for a way to get to his mother. As he was looking around for a way out of the city he saw a horse already with saddle and bridle. He jumped on the horse and took off for his mother. Along the way he was stopped by the police. He was taken to the city council building, and confronted by the mayor of the town. Accused of horse stealing, they put him in a room with the mayor where he told his story. The mayor wanted to arrest him. But my dad had other ideas. He punched out the mayor, ran out of the building and found his horse. Jumping into the saddle he continued on to see his mother before she died. Upon reaching her he let the horse loose to return home and stayed with Chaya and his mother until she passed. Chaya, Sol and dad spent years in Uzbekistan. My dad remembered it fondly. He was happy to have work and be able to support himself and his siblings. All of them had jobs and so life was OK. In 1947/48 at the end of the war they were sent to a Displaced Persons camp (I think in Germany). There they waited for visas to go to the USA where Gert, Betty, and Shirley already lived. They came by boat to New York city (I think through Ellis Island) where they were met by Aunt Gert. After disembarking Gert gave Sol and Sam their English names.