Faye Schulman

Faye Schulman (28 November 1919 – 24 April 2021) was a Jewish partisan photographer, and the only such photographer to photograph their struggle in Eastern Europe during World War II.^[1] Her full name was Faigel "Faye" Lazebnik Schulman.^[2]

Surviving the Holocaust[]

She was born in Sosnkowicze, Eastern Poland (now Lenin in Western Belarus). After the Nazis invaded Belarus, her family was imprisoned in the Lenin Ghetto. On August 14, 1942, German forces killed 1,850 Jews from the ghetto, including much of her family. 26 Jews were not killed, and Schulman was spared because of her photographic skills that she had learned from her brother Moishe.^[3][4] She was recruited to work as a photographer for the Nazis.^[5] She developed a photograph which she saw depicted her family dead in a mass grave, and this convinced her to join the resistance.^[5] She joined the Molotava Brigade which was composed mostly of Soviet prisoners of war who had escaped from German captivity, and worked for them as a nurse from September 1942 to July 1944.^[6] She also took over 100 photographs after getting her photographic equipment back in a raid.^[4][6]

About the Soviet partisans, Schulman recalled that "sex was not a major issue in our group. We didn't think in terms of men and women, boys and girls. We treated each other as equals. There were no special privileges for women; we were all partisans and we knew that death in war did not spare anyone. Certainly in battle, there was no differentiation between men and women. All our thoughts were concentrated on defeating the enemy." In her memoir, she told of thievery and drunkenness, of an officer who nearly killed her when she rejected his advances, and of antisemitism, writing: "Because I was Jewish, I had to work twice as hard to be deemed as worthy as the gentile girls. When I worked night and day I was told, 'You are not like a Jewish girl. You are just like the Russian girls.' This was meant to be a compliment." She always replied: "'Yes, but I am Jewish.' My work as a nurse, a photographer and most of all as a soldier was plentiful reason for me to stand tall, to be proud of myself and my heritage."^[7]

In spite of those shortcomings, she was grateful to the partisans for their help in defeating the Nazis. About the experience, she wrote: "We all belonged to one brigade. We learned to live together, eat together, fight together and survive together. We also needed to get along with each other. Sometimes it was hard to live through one day, let alone years. There was a strong friendship, cooperation and loyalty amongst most of us and a willingness to help each other. In the forest, connections were made between disparate people. Cold, hunger, stress forced strangers to become like family. We were also comrades in arms, all dealing with the same life-and-death circumstances. Our lives were bonded by the dangerous conditions under which we constantly lived. A special bond, nonetheless, existed among those of us who had experienced similar horrors under the Nazis."^[7]

Post-war[]

After her time in the resistance, she married Morris Schulman, and they stayed in the Landsberg displaced persons camp in Germany, where they helped to smuggle weapons to support Israeli independence.^[3] In 1948, they immigrated to Canada.^[3][6]

Legacy and writings[]

Schulman has been decorated by the Soviet/Belorussian, American and Canadian governments. She wrote A Partisan's Memoir: Woman of the Holocaust (1995).^[5]

Personal life[]

Schulman lived in Toronto. She is survived by two children (Sidney and Susan), six grandchildren (Michael, Daniel, Nathan, Rachelle, Matthew, and Steven), and three great grandchildren (Imogene, Beckham, and Lila).^[8]

References[]

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