Schlaff is unser Hand zu streiten, stark un schwer is unser Schmerz,
Kum-zhe du mit Treist un Liebe, gutes heisses jüdisch Herz!
Brüder, Schwester, hot rachmones: groiss un schrecklich is di Noit,
Giebt di Toite oif Tachrichim, giebt di Lebedige Broit!
[39] Massa Nemirov. This heading was chosen to appease the censor. As the name Kishinev could not be mentioned, Nemirov was chosen, being the name of the town which yielded the largest number of victims during the Cossack massacres of 1648. [See vol. I, p. 146, et seq.—In a later edition the poem was renamed Be-'Ir ha-Haregah, "In the city of Slaughter.">[
[CHAPTER XXXIV]
CONTINUED POGROMS AND THE RUSSO-JAPANESE WAR
1. The Pogrom at Homel and the Jewish Self-Defence
No sooner had the Zionist Congress, at which the heated discussions concerning the salvation of Judaism were intermingled with sobs bemoaning the martyrs of Kishinev, concluded its sessions than a new catastrophe broke out in the dominions of the Tzar—the pogrom at Homel, in the Government of Moghilev. In this lively White-Russian town, in which the twenty thousand Jews formed fully one-half of the population, public Jewish life was marked by great vigor. There existed in the city important societies of Zionists and Socialists. Both of these parties had organized several self-defence contingents, and it was to be expected that the disgrace of Kishinev would not be repeated at Homel, and that, in the case of an attack, the Jews would give a good account of themselves.
On August 29, 1903, a fight broke out on the market-place between a crowd of Jews and Christians. The cause of the quarrel was a trivial incident, one peasant trying to carry off from a Jewish store a barrel of herrings at a lower price than the one demanded by the storekeeper. The rowdyish purchaser was pushed out of the store, but the peasants on the market-place took sides with him, and in the ensuing fight between them and the Jew, one peasant was accidently killed. The peasants were scared and took to their heels, while the police began to make arrests among the Jews. The Jews might have been satisfied with the fact that their energetic attitude had succeeded in preventing a pogrom, did they not anticipate the revenge which was sure to be wreaked upon them.
Two days passed in a state of tense agitation. On the third day, on September 1, a crowd of Russian workingmen, numbering about two hundred, issued forth from the railroad shops, and began to demolish Jewish residences and houses of worship. The rioters were joined by a mob of stone-cutters, day-laborers, and ragamuffins. Here and there the crowd was incited by a few "intellectuals": a merchant, a student, and a teacher. On the Konnaya Square, the mob was checked by a large detachment of the Jewish self-defence, consisting of several hundred men. The rioters were on the point of giving way before the gallant attack of the self-defence; but at that moment the troops appeared on the scene, and fired a volley in the direction of the Jews, resulting in three killed and several wounded. The assistance rendered by the troops filled the rioters with fresh courage, and they continued their work of destruction with renewed vigor. All over the town a chain of soldiers shielded the attacking hordes against the Jewish self-defence contingents which tried in vain to break through the chain. The defenders were driven off with rifle butts and bayonets, while the rioters were allowed to destroy and murder without let or hindrance. In the evening, the pogrom was stopped; the results were twelve killed or dangerously wounded Jews, eight killed or dangerously wounded Christians, a large number of maltreated and slightly wounded Jews and over two hundred and fifty devastated Jewish residences and stores. Among those arrested by the police was a considerably larger number of self-defending Jews than of attacking Christians.