Letter from 1947 - click below letter to enlarge

Translated to English - Hebrew Translation below

Letter - written in Russian by Dr. Burba of Mazeikiai to Mr. Kalman Aharoni of Toledo, Ohio USA 
(The original Russian was translated by Rita Shapiro in Israel to Hebrew; Benzi Kahana wrote it out, Leorah typed it in Hebrew; the Hebrew was translated into English by Arye Harry Shamir, and checked and corrected by Leorah Kroyanker). 

April 27, 1947 

Dear Mr. Aronowitz, 

I have recently received your letter - and I am quite surprised that you had not received my letters. I have written to you several times - thanking you for the package - a Jew wrote you a letter in Yiddish - did you not receive those letters? 

You are asking when your mother was murdered. In 1941 the Germans shot her along with other women and children, on the 3rd or 4th of August, 1941. 

The men were shot earlier, on the 16th of July, 1941. Of your house nothing remains, except of a bit of the foundations. Of the Jews that had been in Mazeikiai before the War, nothing remains - other than those who were elsewhere and survived. For example: Dr. Gurbitzin in Kovno [Kaunas] , Shapira, the Lichtenstein children, Glick (the butcher), Dr. Sauhouta and his daughter, Neiman, the barber, - all either in Kovna or Vilna. Pevsner lives in Mazeikiai - Bloch's son is alive. 

We are living well. For my work I recently received a prestigious award - the Red Flag Decoration. The Soviet government recognizes intellectuals and compensates them. 

I congratulate you on the birth of your daughter, and also your sister the Doctor - I think she also has a child. 

Regards to you and your family. 

I thank you for everything - and my wife curtseys to you. You have done many good deeds for me. 

Dr. P. Burba 

PS: You may write me in English. I understand that in Russian it is difficult 
for you.

Hebrew version click to read