Epilogue

The Jewish community of Viipuri was destroyed in the turmoil of the Winter War and never rose again. The Jews of Viipuri were largely dispersed to Helsinki, Turku, and Tampere. This page brings together their accounts of the Viipuri congregation, as well as the fates of the community members during and after the wars.

Salomon Altschuler Remembers Everything About Vyborg

By Leif Furman – Hakehila Magazine 5/2006; 2/5767

Salomon Altschuler’s memory does not fail him. “I remember everything about Vyborg. People’s names, phone numbers, addresses—everything. I even remember your father-in-law’s father, the lawyer Herold.” This is quite impressive, as I only mentioned my wife’s father’s Viipuri background to Salomon during this interview. But Salomon Altschuler is a spry elderly man, his mind as sharp as can be. And he is only 93 years old. “There aren't many of us Viipuri Jews left in Helsinki anymore, maybe a dozen. I am the oldest among them.”

Salomon Altschuler has fond memories of Viipuri. “We had an exceptionally fine congregation in Viipuri, about 270 people. It was tight-knit, and not many considered themselves so-called 'better' people. We had every possible activity in Viipuri: there was the community center Ahdus, the youth society Hazair, the sports club Kadur, scouts, Wizo, the Women’s Society (Fruntimmersförening), a large library, and a Jewish theater. We lacked for nothing. I myself was the secretary of the youth society, and all the minutes were written in Yiddish. We had a lot of interaction and activities with the people of Helsinki and Turku.”

“About 85 percent of us attended Finnish-speaking schools, about 10 percent were Swedish-speaking, and the rest spoke Russian as their primary language. Among the latter was Wulf Gurevitsch, who won a Finnish national championship. In the Finnish schools, there was no antisemitism at all. I had truly good classmates. Among the best of them were Sten Suvio, the 1936 Olympic boxing champion; Johannes Virolainen, a multi-term minister and Counselor of State; and Eino Pyykkö, who was later appointed the town manager of Järvenpää.”

“These best friends of mine would very often come to our house to eat Jewish food during school breaks. We didn’t have a Jewish school of our own. Ljuba Kamraksan’s (née Bortnovsky) father Hirsch was the Jewish teacher for us boys, and her mother Mina taught the girls. They visited our homes. In almost every family, the home language was Yiddish. Kosher food was eaten in nearly every household. About 85 percent of the Jews made their living in the garment industry. There were tailors, hat merchants, three judges, and even a doctor.”

“Almost all the Jews lived in the center of Viipuri. The shul (synagogue) was slightly outside the city. Our first rabbi was an old fellow named Segall. After him came Hirsch Nahum Maslovat, and then Rabbi Haschea Scher from Latvia. The latter met a hard fate. When the Winter War began, he remained alone in Viipuri. After some time, he managed to return to his home country, where he perished.”

“In the Viipuri Market Hall, at Kulmahalli, you could buy kosher food. There was a butcher named Makkonen who had two sales counters side-by-side. From one, you could get kosher, and from the other, ordinary meat. Makkonen himself wasn’t allowed to sell the kosher meat; that was handled by our own people. The meat was slaughtered according to Jewish laws. Every Thursday, the mammas and bobes (grandmothers) would be queuing for meat and squabbling over the best cuts. Non-Jews didn't buy from that counter.”

“The war killed the Viipuri Jewish congregation. The wooden shul took a hit on the very first day of the war and burned down completely. Everything was destroyed. Fortunately, people managed to leave before the war started. I was in the army myself and found out the police had told my parents to take food for two days with them. Everything else was left at home. They could only take the clothes on their backs. A Paasivaara delivery van came to pick them up and took my parents 20 km outside of Helsinki.”

Salomon Altschuler ended up in Helsinki via Turku, where he worked for a while at Klimscheffski’s. His parents were given a basement room at Dagmarinkatu 9 in Helsinki, where Salomon later joined them. It was cramped. The first years were difficult, and Salomon Altschuler does not remember them with warmth. According to him, the Helsinki Jews treated those from Viipuri rudely.

But there were pleasant moments too. “I met my wife, Doris, by chance. After the wars, I was working in Turku and playing football for Makkabi. We came to Helsinki to play. At one point, I was in the city center and saw Abi Kagan from Viipuri at the corner of Primula with his future wife, Bashe. With them was a young, pretty girl, who was Doris Weintraub. That evening, there was a joint party (a sits, an evening of singing and some wine and drinks) at the Makkabi club, where Doris was also present. I had my eye on her. I went back to Turku, but I didn't stay there long. I wanted to get to Helsinki and to Doris. That’s how it started.”

Much remained untold in this story, but finally, Salomon Altschuler shares a funny anecdote from Viipuri:

“Old Mr. Kaplun spoke poor Finnish. One day, he came to my father's shop and asked a woman working there to call Kravts. The girl heard that the address was on Torkkelinkatu. When someone answered the phone, Kaplun asked: 'Is this Beku?' 'No, it’s not Beku.' 'Well, is Papa home?' 'Yes.' 'Ask Papa to come to the phone.' Papa came to the phone. 'Is this Beku? Can you come to our minyan?' 'To where?' 'To a minyan.' 'What? Where, where?'

'Don't you speak Yiddish? Is this not Beku Kravts?' 'No, this is Krause.' The girl had heard the address correctly, but the name wrong. That was Vyborg for you.”

Sports Club Kadur

From "Stages of the Vyborg Jewish Community," (p. 82, paragraph 7.2)

The youth of Vyborg engaged in many sports—primarily football (soccer) during the snowless seasons and ice skating during the winters. A sports club was eventually founded in Vyborg; while its activities were not strictly limited to any specific sport, the club's name revealed its primary focus. Sports Club Kadur (Kadur is Hebrew for "ball") was, in practice, a football club.

In the early 1930s, the team traveled to Sortavala, among other places, to play an away match against a local team. Although Kadur lost the game decisively (3–0), the local newspaper wrote a flattering report on the Vyborg team, complete with photographs.

Only one member of that same team continued his athletic career to the very top: Wolf Karni (originally Koseloff). Wolf Karni (1911–1996) later traded his player’s jersey for a referee’s uniform, building a distinguished career as one of Finland's leading referees in football, handball, and bandy. He officiated three football matches at the 1952 Helsinki Summer Olympics, including the semifinal between Yugoslavia and Germany. That same year, he became the first Finnish referee qualified to officiate an international match in England—specifically, England vs. the Netherlands.

Vulf "Vuli" Gurevitsch (b. 1904), who was the Finnish heavyweight boxing champion in 1930 and finished fourth in the European Championships in Budapest that same year, had also competed for Kadur in his time.

In the Ahdus magazine, Kadur was criticized for seeking only "material merits." The magazine reminded the club that its main goal should be to strive toward including "nationalist content" (the creation of the State of Israel) in its work, following the example of Jewish sports clubs throughout the world.

Brothers Abi and Tevi Kagan Have Experienced the Beauty of Vyborg and the Horrors of War

By Eeva Nikkilä-Kiipula/STT, Hakehila Magazine no. 5/2002; 2/5763

Karhumäki. Poventsa. Syväri. Tali. Ihantala. – They were bad places. Then again, there are no places in war other than bad ones, reflect Helsinki brothers Abi Kagan (81) and Tevi Kagan (79) on the eve of Finnish Independence Day.

Now we are sitting in the beautiful, sunny living room of the older brother, Abi, in Munkkiniemi, Helsinki. But originally, these men were born and bred in Viipuri. "Vyborg was the best city in the world. There is none better," both assert as if with one voice.

Neither has seen their birth city since the war, but like other former residents of Vyborg, they refresh their memories in an informal "Viipuri Boys" club. It meets every Tuesday in a restaurant in central Helsinki, where even one of the private cabinets is named after Vyborg.

"At the meetings, everyone talks as much as they possibly can. It’s incredibly fun. Recently, I met a classmate there whom I had last seen in 1939. There we were, sitting at the same table," Tevi chuckles.

The Distinctive Character of Viipuri Jews

In Viipuri, the Jewish community of a couple of hundred people had its own wooden synagogue. "It, along with our cemetery, was destroyed in the bombings on the first day of the Winter War," Abi recalls. Unlike other Finnish Jews, those in Viipuri also had their own two-story club building with a library, kitchen, and banquet halls.

The Vyborg Jews, including the Kagan brothers, are still proud of the distinctiveness that set them apart from other Finnish Jews. "Language was the decisive factor. In Viipuri, we spoke Finnish, Yiddish, Russian, and Swedish. We had an international flair. In Helsinki, for example, the Jews spoke Swedish. They were all svenskatalande (Swedish-speaking) back then," Tevi describes with a mischievous look on his face.

The Home City Soon Became Deserted

The Kagan family had a hat and fur shop in Vyborg, which had to be abandoned when the Winter War began. The parents, along with Tevi and his sister, traveled to Varkaus, where they had relatives. 18-year-old Abi stayed in Vyborg for civil defense duties (vss). "The abbreviation vss eventually turned into a joke: vasen silmä sokea ('left eye blind')," the brothers laugh.

After the evacuation, the city was almost deserted, with hardly any civilians living there. During the Winter War, Abi served as a first-aid man in his hometown. "When I left Vyborg on February 18, 1940, no one was left there," he says.

Tevi vividly remembers when news reached them in Varkaus that the first boy they knew had fallen in battle. "My sister cried for him for a week. And the same situation repeated every time a new death notice arrived."

During the Interim Peace, the family moved from Varkaus to Helsinki, where a rental apartment awaited. For the Viipurians, everything in the capital felt strange.

However, ordinary daily life did not last long; by January 1942, Tevi, who had been working at the Wärtsilä shipyard, left for the army in Hamina. Abi, meanwhile, had been turning grenades in Pietarsaari during the Interim Peace until he started his army service in Hämeenlinna in 1941, where he also attended non-commissioned officer school.

The Situation in Vuosalmi was "Absolutely Terrible"

When the Continuation War began, the brothers were sent to different fronts: Abi to the Maaselkä Isthmus in East Karelia, and Tevi to the Syväri (Svir) River and the Karelian Isthmus as part of General Lagus’s troops.

Abi served in artillery fire control. "There were battles, and enough of them," he says with gallows humor.

The worst was yet to come: the Russian breakthrough on the Karelian Isthmus in the summer of 1944. "aimed for a strong counter-attack at Vuosalmi, but the Russians made it across the Vuoksi River. It was absolutely horrific. Everything that can usually fall from the sky fell on our heads," Tevi describes.

Eventually, he jumped for cover into a large pit where a familiar man from the same division was already hiding. "The situation was dire."

But the firestorm continued, and as Lagus’s men advanced on the Isthmus, they encountered panicked deserters. "On the other hand, 'deserter' is perhaps a harsh word for a person who has lost their nerves," Tevi reflects.

In his opinion, all the battlefields on the Isthmus were bad, but one stood above the rest—Ihantala in July 1944.

Difficulty Finding Cover in Ihantala

The battle at Ihantala was fought on a hard clay field where it was difficult for soldiers to find cover. "A previously dug trench saved many lives," Tevi says.

He remembers seeking shelter under a large glacial erratic boulder that still stands in that field today. "The noise there was so terrible that I lost my hearing in both ears for three days. All I could hear was a hum. Major General Einar Vihma fell in those battles."

In Ihantala, the Finns used effective Panzerfausts (anti-tank weapons) received from Germany. "Every guy had a 'fist.' They were used against things like Russian tanks dug into the ground. My friends and I have wondered many times afterward how we got out of there alive."

At the end of August, about a week before the armistice, Tevi moved backward with the rest of Lagus’s men. They traveled by bicycle in heavy rain until the first house appeared on the Enso side. Only an old master of the house was there, who remarked to the men: "Boys, you have good luck when you move and it's raining." "I will never forget that man's words," Tevi recalls nearly 60 years later.

Retreat in Good Order

From Enso, Lagus’s men evacuated goods day and night to the Finnish side. "I remember how the boys knocked a big hole in the wall of the paper mill, and we got a paper machine out of there," Tevi remembers.

Abi’s troops, for their part, withdrew from Karhumäki toward Finland in a tremendous hurry. "However, there was no panic; the retreat happened according to a pre-planned schedule. All equipment had to be brought along. If we had to leave cannons behind, their breechblocks were destroyed to make them useless."

Tevi's war journey continued in Lapland, where he was involved in driving out the Germans.

No Knowledge of Jewish Persecution at the Front

During the war, the Jewish Kagan brothers felt no conflict regarding the fact that Germans were brothers-in-arms with the Finns. "At the front, we had no information about the persecutions the Germans were carrying out against Jews. The matter only became clear to us after the war," both say.

Furthermore, the goal of the war was crystal clear to them: fighting in the Finnish army for Finland's independence.

Neither came face-to-face with Germans during the war. "My closest 'contact' was when I heard General Lagus scolding German soldiers in Tali. They had left one day with their fancy Tiger tanks and left us Finns there with our old tanks," Tevi recalls.

They also experienced no antisemitism in the army during the war. "I don't think anyone in my group even knew I was Jewish," Tevi points out, and Abi nods beside him.

Nightmares for a While

Memories of the war remain vivid for both, but they no longer touch them as directly as they did immediately after it ended. "For the first six months, I had nightmares, and when I woke up, my pajamas were always soaked in sweat," Tevi describes. "In the nightmares, I was always trying to run away, but I never reached safety. Gradually, however, the nightmares stopped. Time did its work," Abi confirms.

Tevi says he recognizes a sense of sorrow in one specific place. "The feeling comes when I visit the cemetery in our cottage parish, Längelmäki. It’s a small municipality, but there are so many hero graves," he sighs.

Finnish Jews in the Winter and Continuation Wars

About 300 Jewish soldiers fought in the Finnish army during the Winter and Continuation Wars. In addition, there were several dozen women in Lotta Svärd and nursing roles.
A total of 23 Jews fell in the wars: 15 in the Winter War and 8 in the Continuation War. This mortality rate (approx. 8%) was higher than that of any other Finnish congregation (at the time, Jewish congregations had about 2,000 members total).
With permission from the General Staff, a field synagogue was erected on the banks of the Syväri River. Jewish soldiers arrived on foot, skis, or horseback for services—even as German soldiers watched from nearby.
Two magazines, Front-Karolina and Makkabi, conveyed the feelings of Jewish soldiers to the home front.
17 Jewish soldiers were promoted to the rank of officer.
The German Iron Cross was awarded to three Finnish Jews: a captain on the northern front, a chief physician at a hospital in the north, and a hospital Lotta. All refused to accept the decoration.
On Independence Day 1944, President and Marshal of Finland C.G.E. Mannerheim visited the Helsinki Synagogue to present a laurel wreath in memory of the fallen Jewish soldiers.
The Association of Jewish War Veterans has over fifty members, with 40 living in Helsinki and Turku and the rest abroad.

Vyborg Jewish Congregation