Bejla Rifka Manowicz

Bejla Rifka's family were merchants, and she and her husband ran a general store in Kossow. She was a sharp businesswoman--honest and fair. Her granddaughter said that some customers would only do business when Bejla Rifka was at the store.

Helen also said that she had some kind of mysterious ailment that made her "bleed at the throat" (cough up blood, perhaps?) She was strong, but often thought she was dying. (She would ask her daughter Golda to get little Hindeleh to "feel the fees (feet)" to see if she were dying.)

Bejla Rifka was very charitable, and every Friday before Shabbat, Brayna and Hinde would make the rounds of the little community, delivering gifts of food to the poor.

Helen said that her grandma loved her, but she was very strict, often severely so. Bejla Rifka died in the synagogue during prayers, sometime after the war had begun.

Note: Helen said she learned of her grandma's death "from an uncle", and we assumed that perhaps the family in Poland had been in contact with either Uncle Meyer Manowicz, or Hy Margolis (Zelda Manowicz' husband). At that point in time, we did not know that Chaim Bursztejn (Noima's husband) had actually SURVIVED the Holocaust and emigrated to Israel, along with his son Dan and daughter-in-law Ita. Looking back, it makes more sense to assume that the details of Bejla Rifka's death were probably supplied by Helen's Uncle Chaim Bursztejn or by his daughter-in-law Ita, rather than through some miraculous communication with family during the war (highly improbable).