The Escape From Russia Story
1950
A true story of what my, grandfather Ed Lazaroff did.
Written in 2010 Re-written 01/2016
Howard Yasgar
This story was written to assist anyone researching the Lazaroff family history in New Haven Connecticut.
It tells a unique story of how Edward Abraham Lazaroff, my grandfather and my hero, he rescued my grandmother, my mother and my aunt Adele from Russia. Then went back and brought out many brothers and cousins.
Most all of the information written here, was collected around 1950, when I was eleven years old, and my family was living on Davis Street,in Westville Connecticut.
My mother was Betty Yasgar the eldest of Edward Lazaroff’s three daughters.
His three daughters were Betty, Adele and Lillian.
Betty and Adele were born in Russia, Lillian was born in America.
When I was eleven years old, I wasn’t really that interested in my families history, so I think it’s really amazing that I have been able to record as much information as I have.
My mother and her sister Adele always were very reluctant to discuss their childhoods in Russia, so we can assume it wasn’t a good memory.
So all the information had to be collected in little bits and pieces, over several years.
I Also owe a debt of gratitude to my cousin Allen, Allen, who is Adele’s son is an excellent researcher and he dug up all the information on when Grandpa Ed first arrived in Baltimore Maryland, and then the subsequent entry of the Lazaroff family into the United States.
Allen also researched information regarding the SS Zeeland, the ship they came to America on.
My earliest memories start when I was about ten or eleven years old. I knew my grandfather as Grandpa Eddie, however his youngest daughter Lillian told me his full name was Edward, Abraham, Lazaroff.
When I was about 8 years old and my family lived in Westville, Connecticut, I remember that my Grandpa Eddie, always made it his business to come and visit us, and he was using public transportation to do it.
Every time he came he would bring me little toys, some of the toys had parts missing and some had burn marks, and they all smelled real bad.
Mom always said that Grandpa probably picked them up in someones trash pile, and she made me throw them away after Grandpa left the house.
Later when Grandpa had a car, he would take me and my cousin Allen to Woodmont beach to go swimming.
I remember those beach trips well, because at that time Grandpa drove us all in his 1950 Studebaker, it was a car that looked the same in the front as in the back.
Now, the Grandpa Eddie that I remember, was a fairly imposing fellow with a strong stature, he was slightly balding with light brown hair. But he had what I would call a solid, strong look about him, and I thought he carried himself well.
I think my grandfather Eddie, walked, talked and carried himself like a person that had a military background, which is exactly what he said he had.
Grandpa Ed told me that as a young man he served for a while in the Russian army as a Polish language translator, and then he said that he had served for a while in the Polish army as a Russian language translator. I had always thought the story sounded a little far fetched.
I learned that when Grandpa was a young man, he lived in a small village called Mastatchka Pavlov which was located somewhere close to the Polish border.
Back then the borders between Russia and Poland were not clearly defined and it was referred to as the frontier.
So it was entirely possible that at various times their small village was controlled by either the Russian or the Polish armed forces, and it could be entirely possible that they had both used Grandpa as a translator.
I remember that it was at about the age of 60 that grandpa Ed’s hair was really starting to turn white, and he was developing a distinct round bald spot.
The reason I remember the bald spot was because I had kept a pet squirrel, and the squirrel had very sharp claws.
One day the squirrel climbed up grandpa’s pants leg all the way up to his bald spot, and scratched the hell out of his head.
Grandpa was pretty mad for awhile, but once the bleeding stopped he was OK with it.
I remember grandpa Eddie had a slight droop on the left side of his mouth. When I asked him about it, he told me it was from a German soldier’s bayonet, and he said he got the wound when he jumped into the soldiers fox hole during the first world war.
But mom later told me the droop in grandad’s mouth was really the result of a botched operation to remove a goiter.
My moms explanation disappointed me, as grandpa’s war story about the foxhole sounded much better.
Now I also remember visiting Grandpa’s house that he had bought on West Street in New Haven.
I was told he had lived on Munson Street prior to that but I don’t recall anything about the Munson Street house.
What I do remember that whenever we visited my grandparents, especially on holidays, my Grandmother Molly, would always make some traditional Russian pastries.
I never thought any of the stuff tasted very good.
She made one pastry that was like knotted dough and flavored with ginger and honey and it glistened red.
No one I have ever spoken too knows what the hell it was called, which is just as well, as I don’t want any more of it.
On the other hand, I do remember grandpa’s next door Italian neighbors on West Street who always brought over stuffed artichokes. They were so good that we got the recipe from them and still make them today.
One day Grandpa Eddie, took me out into the backyard of his West Street house, he wanted to show me an addition he was building all by himself.
He was so very proud of the fact that he was doing it all by himself, he even showed me that he had a hand operated machine in his yard that he used to make one cinder block at a time.
My aunt Lillian later confirmed that the addition that grandad was building was to be her new bedroom in the West Street house.
On occasion I stayed overnight with my grandparents at the West Street house.But I don’t ever remember ever getting a good night’s sleep.
Grandpa Eddie and grandmother Molly both slept in one big bed with me in the middle, and my Grandpa snored so loud I could never fall a sleep.
What I heard about my grandfather from all his daughters was that he was a strict authoritarian, grandpa just told you how things were to be done and you did it.
Because of this, he had raised his three daughters in a very strict manner, and I could always sense that there was tension, between my Grandad and his daughters. It was as if his daughters resented his strictness.
Sometimes, when I listened to the way they talked and treated him, it made me feel bad for him. It was like now that the daughters were all grown up, they were punishing their father for bringing them up to be good people.
Over the years, from the stories I heard from family members, Eddie was the strong one in the Lazaroff family, and he was responsible for bringing most of the Lazaroff family to the United States.
I am sure the family would all probably all deny it, but there was no question that Grandpa Eddie was a strong personality but he was capable of getting any job done.
I think the entire Lazaroff family resented him because of his having that inner strength they didn’t have.
That having been said, here is the story that I learned about my Grandfather Eddie Lazaroff.
He was born in Russia around 1887, in the small village of Mestatchka Pablov and he told me that he served for a period of time in both the Russian and Polish armies as a translator, which was improbable but possible.
He lived in area of Russia that is now called Belaruse, or White Russia, in those days the Russian or Polish border (The Frontier) was never clearly defined, so at various times, their village may have been under control by Russia and at other times under control by Poland.
Grandpa did speak both Russian and Polish, as well as excellent English.
My mother said that one of the reasons, the Lazaroff family made the decision to leave Russia, was because of the constant attacks by the Cossacks.
Over the years, I often wondered why my mother or her sister Adele never seemed to want to talk about their childhood in Russia. It could have been because there was only a few good memories to tell, or it could just be because they were only eight and nine years old when they left Russia they remembered very little that was worth talking about.
My mother said that in their village of Mastachka Pablov they lived in a one room house, where the rooms were divided by sheets hanging from the ceiling.
Mom said she wasn’t really sure where Mastachka Pablov was, since at the time there were no maps. So she could never show me where their village was located.
However we have determined its general location by putting several clues together.
Mom said that the closest big Russian city was Minsk, and her father, had taken her there twice.
So she knew their village was somewhere in between Minsk and the Polish frontier.
Once Russia opened up due to Glasnost in the late 1980’s, maps were printed, and we found that the city of Pavlov fit her description pretty good and by adding the diminutive “ka” onto the village name “Mastachka” I assume they probably lived in a small village next to the city of Pablov.
Grandpa Eddie told me that his marriage to Molly Aranoff, (Her Russian name was Malka) was pre arranged by his and her parents.
Grandpa said that on the day they were to meet, he was scared to death to meet Malka as he was thinking she might be ugly, but he said, that he was very surprised to see how pretty she was.
Grandpa Eddie said he had a bad hernia at the time of the wedding and he said one testicle was hanging very low, and consequently his voice had changed dramatically. Because of this. he said to me that over the years he often wondered what his new bride Malka thought about that, but he never had the nerve to ask her.
Years later, my mother remembered seeing her father working as a blacksmith, and she said he made her a tricycle out of scrap metal.
Mom said she had the only tricycle in her entire village.
Regarding their everyday life in Russia, my mother said they lived very frugally. They were all in a one room house with the areas divided by curtains.
She said They only had meat on rare occasions, and whenever they had it, the piece of meat was always shredded and shared equally among the entire family.
My mother’s Russian name was “Bluma,” which meant flower, and her younger sister Adele, was named Chaja, and together after school, their job was watching an apple orchard.
Mom remembers that one day she forgot to bring a lunch for her younger sister Chaja, so Chaja suggested that she would eat the sandwich that day, and my mother could eat tomorrow.
Mom said that her sister Chaja always came up with lots of funny jokes like that.
As a teenager Chaja because of her joking around acquired the nickname “Adele Gebacht”, which in Yiddish meant half baked Adele.
The other thing my mother vividly remembered, was the Cossacks.
Back in 1917, Russia was still a feudal society, and it was a dangerous place to live.
Each city had their own army called the Cossacks, and the Cossacks would ride in on horseback and raid the smaller villages in the countryside.
They would steal livestock and sometimes rape and kill the people.
So in their village everyone was always terrified by threat of being attacked by the Cossacks.
The other problem was that at the time, the border with Poland and Russia was ever changing, and never clearly defined thus many small villages really didn’t know from day to day if they were located in Russia or Poland.
Thus when the countries of Russia and Poland were at war, each of the small villages in the countryside suffered, and the people who lived in these border areas were always caught in the middle.
Mom said that many people were indiscriminately killed by both the Russian or Polish army, and that was the reason so many people wanted to leave their villages for safer places, but most people had nowhere to go.
My mother said that as long as she remembered there was always a rumor circulating in her village that in America, the streets were paved with gold, all you had to do was pick it up.
Her village had a meeting, and they decided to send someone to America, and that young man, was my Grandpa Eddie.
At the time he was thirty years old, married, and had two daughters.
Little is known why he was picked, but it may have been because Eddie was a strong decisive person, had military training and multilingual.
We suspect there were other cousins from Russia that must have preceded Eddie to America but their actual relationship to my grandfather is unknown.
We do know from my aunt Lillian, that Grandpa’s sponsor in New Haven was an uncle living on 54 Vernon Street, and that he was a blacksmith by trade.
We also know that grandpa was learning to be a blacksmith in Russia so that could have been the connection.
The Vernon Street address became grandpa Eddie’s first permanent address in America, and he used it on all his future immigration paperwork.
Cousin Alan, did a bit of internet research and came up with the following information, some of which has also been verified by my aunt Lillian, who was Grandpa Eddie’s youngest daughter.
On Grandpa Eddie’s first trip to America, he arrived at the port in Baltimore, Maryland. That was his first point of entry on Feb 8, 1918, and once he was in America, it appears he immediately joined the U.S. Army.
Aunt Lillian, has a photo of grandpa Eddie in his U.S. military uniform.
It was taken at sometime in Baltimore. I saw Lillian’s picture, and my Grandfather was a pretty handsome looking guy in his WW 1 military uniform.
Grandpa Eddie told me that he obtained the rank of sergeant, and I think that while he was in the army he had also obtained his U.S. Citizenship.
It appears that there had always been a plan in place for Eddie to somehow return to Russia, and smuggle his family out, and then to assist other family members to immigrate to America.
I was never able to determine who financed all of this. Or who financed any of Grandpa Ed’s repeated trips back and forth to Europe.
Grandpa told me, that he was told that American army officers, were treated like royalty in Europe. So knowing that, he illegally dressed up as a commissioned officer, complete with fancy leggings, and a swagger stick. At the time a swagger stick was only carried by commissioned officers.
So now, dressed up as a commissioned officer, he arrived in Germany and then made his way through Poland to the Russian frontier.
Grandad said that at every town along the way, the word was sent that an American officer was coming, and all the small town bands were waiting for him, they were all playing American and British military music when they greeted him.
Grandpa said, that just as he expected, upon his arriving at the small town in Poland, he was treated like royalty.
However, once he arrived near the Russian and Polish frontier, things changed, he was told he could go no further.
As an American officer, if he were captured in Russian territory, he would immediately be imprisoned and executed as a spy.
So, in that Polish town,which was probably a place called Klechesk, Grandpa Eddie changed ot of his military clothing and was able to find a smuggler who promised to bring his wife Molly and his two daughters out of Russia.
According to Grandpa, he gave the smuggler a substantial sum of money to do the job for him, and then he checked into a local hotel to wait.
When over two weeks went by with nothing happening, grandpa Eddie realized he had been taken.
He felt that the smuggler had stolen his money.
So he went to all the bars in town looking for the guy, and he finally found him.
The smuggler said he no longer had any of Grandpa’s money as he had already given it to someone else to do the job.
Grandad Ed said “I grabbed him by the batsim and didn’t let go until he told me where the money was”. (Grandpa Eddie put his hand down, and it had a claw like grip, and with a snarl, he showed me how he grabbed the guy by the balls).
Then Grandad Eddie said he went into the fellows house and found the money under a loose board in the bedroom.
Now Grandpa had to change his plan, and everything became extremely dangerous.
He used his money to buy farmers clothing, then he bought a team of horses, and a wagon filled with bags of potatoes.
Under cover of darkness, he drove the wagon into Russia and all the way to his village.
The trip must have taken him several days, but once he arrived at his village, he waited in the woods until nightfall.
Then he located his wife and his two daughters and loaded them into empty potato sacks on the wagon.
Again under the cover of darkness, they headed back to Poland.
My mother said that they traveled only at night, hiding during the day in the woods.
She said they only had the potatoes to eat.
Once they were safely in Poland, they made their way to Antwerp Belgium, where they boarded a ship, named the SS Zeeland and made the crossing to America.
My mother said that grandpa Eddie had taught her and her sister Adele how to sing several popular American war songs, all in English.
So Grandpa made the girls sing to anyone aboard the ship, that would listen.
He was so very proud of his daughters being able to sing in English, but my mother said she and Adele just cried all day and night because of it.
Cousin Alen’s internet research came up with some interesting information regarding the ship “SS Zeeland”. It appears the ship SS Zeeland (It’s name had been changed several times), was originally built in the Clydebank shipyard in Glasgow Scotland, and Alan’s grandfather on his father’s side, was employed at that very shipyard in Scotland, and had probably been one of the people that actually helped build the ship.
On Aug 1, 1921, Abraham Lazaroff, age 33, Malka Lazaroff, age 33, Bluma Lazaroff, age 9, and Chaja Lazarof, age 7, all arrived at Ellis Island in New York.
They listed their European home as Kleck Poland.
They used the 54 Vernon Street address in New Haven as their destination.
Grandpa told me that he soon obtained a plumbers license and went to work as an apprentice plumber.
After that, it appears that he traveled back to Russia several times to bring out his ungrateful brothers and cousins, with all of them settling in he New Haven area.
Where the money came from to make all the trips to Russia, has never been explained to me, but it appears grandpa did eventually start the Orange Street Bus line in New Haven, and it’s possible that it was the source of his income.
What my Grandfather Eddie did was nothing less than extraordinary, he gambled his life to rescue all his immediate Lazaroff family members.
As I grew up in New Haven, I don’t recall hearing one word of appreciation from any of the family members towards my grandfather Eddie, as a matter of fact I think they all resented his authoritative attitude.
After my meeting most of the Lazaroff relatives, I wondered if any of his brothers or any of his cousins would have had the nerve to risk their lives for him, I don’t think so.
In my book Grandpa Eddie was a hero.
Eventually granddad Eddie went to work for Metropolitan Life Insurance Company as an insurance agent, he said he carried a book, which meant that every week he went around town knocking on doors to collect twenty five cents to apply against their life insurance policy.
Grandpa Eddie’s accomplishments were many, which included the starting of the Orange Street Bus Line in New Haven.
In his later years around 1953 he pioneered moving to Florida which he called “The Land Of Milk And Honey”.
When grandpa Eddie went to Florida, it was not yet the popular place it is today.
At the time it was just considered a swampland and a home for mosquitoes.
I remember hearing his brothers and other family members talking negatively about him
They said, “He’ll be back”.
Wondering what happened to Grandma Molly.s family the Aranoffs, in 1953, my mother and father and I, took a trip to Canada and drove to St Johns in Nova Scotia, where the Aranoffs had immigrated.
We met Saul and Ben Aranoff his Son, as well as his sons family. Saul was grandma Molly’s brother.
We found the Aranoff’s happy to meet us, they were in the antique and used furniture business in St Johns.
A picture I took in front of their store said Aranoff, used furniture.
The following year Ben Aranoff and his family came to visit us in Westville Connecticut. We have since lost contact with them.
I tried locating the Aranoff’s in St Johns Nova Scotia, but no luck.
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