"In the Fight for Life," >from the Yizkor book of Sokoly, Poland is the
story of a beautiful young woman named Bubcha Safran who gave up a
safe haven with a caring Polish family for the Bialystock ghetto so
that she could live -- and ultimately -- die among Jews. When she and
her family first fled the elimination of Jews in Sokoly, they were
shunned by Poles when they sought shelter and food as they made their
way to the forests in the harsh cold. One night, >from the top of a
hill where she was standing with her increasingly frail and weak
parents, she saw a single light shining >from a house and decided to
try once more. To her surprise, the woman who answered the door
invited them all in to get warm and to eat, and the Safrans became
part of the household. But her turning point came when she was asked
one night to sing a song and choked with tears at the last line:
"Walesam sie jak opetany pies!" (I will wander like a dog without a
home!).

Soon word came "that it was still quiet in the Bialystok ghetto" where
many Sokoly Jews had gathered, and Bubcha saw the chance for her and
her family to be once again "together with their brothers the Children
of Israel." The young man in the household that had taken the Safrans
in told her she faced certain death and implored her not to go. The
ghetto is where the author of this chapter encountered her. "We
parted, and I never saw her again."

URL: https://www.facebook.com/JewishGen.org/posts/2275296165825859

Bruce Drake
Researching: DRACH, EBERT, KIMMEL, ZLOTNICK
Towns: Wojnilow, Kovel