Thursday, June 9, 2016

Who was Leib FISCHLER who died in 1920?

This blogpost is the result of an email from Yaffa VERED nee FISCHLER in Israel, the granddaughter of Leib FISCHLER.

In the Lubaczow Death Registry we read that Leib FISCHLER, 60 years old, either born in or coming from Niemirow, the son of Samuel and Chinka FISCHLER, died in 1920.

Leib is not a Biblical name, but a kinnui, a nickname.
Alexander Beider in his “A Dictionary of Ashkenazic Given Names” writes 
“ In recent centuries, Leyb, its variants and derived forms were used as kinnuim mainly for Judah and Arieh, but sometimes for Moses too”.
The name Chinka was also new to me. According to Beider it comes from  Khane (Chana , חנה). It could be both Chinke and Chinka.

Examining FISCHLER in the Lubaczow Yizkor list, gave the following names:

FISZLER/FISCHLER Yehuda, Kreinze, Schmuel, Rachel, Shimon, Reize and family

Based on the format of the Yizkor list this might mean that a couple named Yehuda and Kreinze FISCHLER/FISZLER were the parents (or grandparents?) of Schmuel/Szmuel/Samuel, Rachel/Rachela, Shimon/Szymon/Simon and Reize (Rosa?) FISCHLER/FISZLER.

Looking at the Pages of Testimony, there is no Page of Testimony for Yehuda/Juda FISCHLER.

There are two Pages for Kreindl /Kreinze FISCHLER.
1. Community member Mendel LEHRER wrote in 1957 that Krajce FISZLER was a widow, had a grocery store, was the widow of Yehuda FISZLER and had four children. He listed her as being 63 when he assumed she was murdered at Belzec in 1942, which means she would have been born around 1879.

2. Her son Noach FISZLER wrote in 1956 that Krajndla FISZLER, the daughter of Aharon Tovia and Rachel (no family name for the parents), was born in Lubaczow in 1880, a housewife, married and the mother of four.

Noach FISZLER wrote an additional two Pages, one for his brother Szmul FISZLER  and one for his brother-in-law Szymon KACBACH.
Szmul Samuel  FISZLER / FISCHLER was born 1898 in Niemirow (now Nyemiruv, Ukraine) , married to Tova/ Tauba nee TEMER and they had four daughters. The family lived in Lubaczow.
Szymon KACBACH / KATZBACH , born 1901 in Chrzanow, was married to Noach’s sister Rachel, and they had three children. The family lived in Lubaczow.

The fact that Mendel Lehrer wrote that Krajce FISZLER was a widow, and the fact that Noach FISZLER did not write a Page of Testimony for his father, brings me to the possibility that Noach’s father Yehuda Juda FISZLER may be Leib FISCHLER who died in 1920.

To strengthen this theory, comes the death of a baby boy in 1933. Little Leib  KATZBACH, only seven weeks old, died in the autumn of 1933. His parents were Szymon KACBACH / KATZBACH and Rachel nee FISZLER / FISCHLER.
Baby Leib KATZBACH  could have been named after his maternal grandfather who had died in 1920. 
Szymon and Rachel KATZBACH / KACBACH also had another son, Aron, born in 1934, who died in 1935. The three children mentioned on the Page of Testimony were probably those alive when the Holocaust started.

Unfortunately I have not been able to locate the grave of Leib FISCHLER/FISZLER who died in 1920. Perhaps in the future this will be possible.

We should probably look for a grave dated TEVET, SHVAT or ADAR 5680
טבת, שבט או אדר תר"פ
The name of the deceased could be
 יהודה בן שמואל
אריה בן שמואל
יהודה לייב בן שמואל

Hopefully  his granddaughter and other descendants in Israel will one day be able to visit his grave. 

Additional information from Yaffa VERED:
Leib FISCHLER was married twice. First to a woman named Necha Neti. Together they had several children. Six weeks after the birth of their son Moses / Moshe FISCHLER, Necha Neti died.
After this, Leib married Kreindl, Necha Neti's sister. Leib and Kreindl then had children together.
Necha and Kreindl were sisters. Their maiden name may have been FISCHLER, though this is not documented, and we do not know the names of their parents.

More information about two of Leib FISCHLER's sons.
1. Zvi Hirsch FISCHLER managed to escape to Eretz Israel just before the war.
2. Moshe FISCHLER left Lubaczow for Vienna in 1915 and then moved to Berlin. There he married. His daughter Ida was born in 1927 in Berlin and his son Juda Leo was born in 1935. For those who understand Hebrew you can listen to Ida's testimony at Yad Vashem by doing a Google search for "Ida Fischler Berlin"



Last, just a guess:
Yaffa VERED never heard that her FISCHLER family was Levites, but believe they were Israel. Despite this, I believe it is worth checking the following gravestone closer:
http://jewishcemeterylubaczow2015.blogspot.no/2015/03/row-26-grave-14-group-six-yehuda.html