The Sochatchover Rebbe on the Polonia
On the Polish steamer Polonia in 1935, the Sochatchover Rebbe, Reb Dovid Bornsztain, walks the deck toward Haifa with Rabbi Yaakov Meir Biderman and Rabbi Yitzchok Meir Levin.
Getty Images, “Jews Sailing to Palestine” (3 September 1913; clip 1032509118). A Jewish community moving from Odessa to Tel Aviv to settle in Palestine. Credit: Footagestore.
Three on the deck
At about 0:11 the camera is on the deck of the Polish steamer Polonia, where the Sochatchover Rebbe, Reb Dovid Bornsztain, walks toward Haifa with Rabbi Yaakov Meir Biderman on his right and Rabbi Yitzchok Meir Levin on his left.
The man on that deck was the third Sochatchover Rebbe, son of Reb Shmuel Bornsztain and grandson of Reb Avrohom Bornsztain. He became Rebbe after his father’s petirah in 1926. His court sat near Łódź, and he built yeshivos under the name Beis Avrohom. Surviving Torah from him was later published as Chasdei Dovid.
The deck around him holds a party of Agudah (Agudath Israel) rabbis from Poland and Lithuania. In the same ship passage, Rabbi Zalman Sorotzkin comes up from below decks. Behind him, briefly, is Rabbi Alexander Zusha Friedman, general secretary of Agudat Yisrael in Poland and author of Maayana shel Torah. The later parts of the reel are Agudat settlement footage.
Haifa ahead
Steamship Polonia, Constanța, Haifa run
Haifa Port (arrival)
32.8194, 35.0044
Satellite view of Haifa Port. The Polonia segment is the Constanța, Haifa run; the named deck footage is at sea, with Haifa as the ship’s destination.
The film and what followed
A few years after this voyage, the German occupation reached Łódź, and the Sochatchover Rebbe was later smuggled into the Warsaw Ghetto on forged papers. He was niftar there on 17 November 1942, of heart failure, hiding on Gęsia Street, and was buried in the Gęsia cemetery. Accounts say he was among the last, or the last, buried there before the cemetery was closed. His wife and children were murdered afterward, and Rabbi Biderman was also murdered. Rabbi Sorotzkin and Rabbi Levin reached Eretz Yisrael.
Timeline
- 1876
- Rabbi Dovid Bornsztain born in Nasielsk, Poland.
- 1926
- Becomes third Sochatchover Rebbe after his father, Rabbi Shmuel Bornsztain, died.
- 1935
- Filmed on the Polonia deck toward Haifa; Sochatchover Rebbe with Rabbi Biderman and Rabbi Levin at about 0:11; Rabbi Sorotzkin and Rabbi Friedman appear in the same ship passage.
- 1939
- German occupation of Poland; later smuggled into the Warsaw Ghetto.
- 17 Nov 1942
- He dies in the Warsaw Ghetto; buried at Gęsia.