Lengthy letter (3 large pages) from R. Aharon Kotler, addressed to R. Chizkiyahu Yosef Mishkovsky. [United States, ca. 1944].
Typewritten, with the handwritten signature of R. Aharon Kotler. The letter discusses Holocaust rescue matters, and the distribution of packages and money to refugees in Russia, Siberia, Teheran and the Far East. The letter discloses confidential information about rescue activities, which are unknown from other sources.
R. Aharon reports of the difficulties political parties pose to the rescue enterprises, and states that matters in the United States are being handled in the same way as in Eretz Israel. Only a few individuals are concretely involved in the rescue activities, which the large organizations and various political parties only hamper. R. Aharon complains of the politicians who take credit in the news for the rescue activities, which are in reality carried out discreetly by individuals devotedly operating under Vaad HaHatzala. R. Aharon reports of the packages shipped to Russia, the efforts made on behalf of orphans who reached Teheran and Eretz Israel ("Yaldei Teheran"), matters of Vaad HaYeshivot, and funds sent for various rescue missions. He also mentions the founding of a yeshiva in Lakewood: "…There is a Kollel in Lakewood for the elite Torah scholars of America, exceptional boys and young men, with superior Torah knowledge, intellectual capacities and fear of G-d, and a significant share of my time is devoted to it". He writes that amidst his preoccupation with rescue activities, the yeshiva remains his island of serenity: "My work there in Torah provides me with serenity and relaxation…" (interesting documentation of the early years of the yeshiva, founded in 1943 in Lakewood, NJ, while R. Aharon still resided in Manhattan, NY).
R. Aharon Kotler (1892-1962), a leading yeshiva dean in Lithuania and Poland, in the Slutsk and Kletsk yeshivot. He was one of the founders of Vaad HaYeshivot, and a member of Moetzet Gedolei HaTorah in Lithuania and the United States. During the Holocaust, he escaped to the United States (via Japan), and was very involved in the rescue activities of Vaad HaHatzala, under the Union of Orthodox Rabbis of the United States and Canada. He held meetings with senior figures in America, and worked intensively to obtain visas for Holocaust refugees, arrange the expedition of packages to survivors, and run fundraising campaigns in the Jewish communities of the United States. During that time, he also established the famous Lakewood yeshiva in New Jersey (a yeshiva which changed the face of the yeshiva world in the United States, by inculcating its students with the passion and absolute devotion to Torah study, which was typical of Lithuanian yeshivot).
Concurrently, R. Chizkiyahu Yosef Mishkovsky, rabbi of Krinik (Krynki; 1884-1946), directed rescue operations from Eretz Israel and London, assisting war refugees, rescuing rabbis and yeshiva students who had fled to Japan and Shanghai, obtaining visas and certificates for immigration to Eretz Israel, and primarily shipping packages of food and clothes to refugees in Siberia and the Far East.
3 leaves (3 pages). Approx. 28 cm. Thin, brittle paper. Fair condition. Stains and mold. Marginal tears (partially repaired with paper).