Rosalia Yankelevna Furmanova

Rosalia Yankelevna Furmanova

This is the sister of my grandmother Sara,  Rozalia (or Reizl) Yankelevna Furmanova (maiden name Shamesh). The photo was taken in Kharkov in 1915.

She didn’t receive any education. She got married very early, at the age of 18 or 19. Her husband Furmanov was the son of a lishenets [lishenets – a man deprived of civil rights in the Soviet period before Stalin], a manufacturer in the past. His factory used to produce beds. He was arrested in 1936 after a denunciation, subjected to repressions and died in prison. And she became a widow, left alone with her daughter, but relatives supported her, and her daughter was able to receive some education. During the war she was in Perm together with our family, where the Kirovsky Theater was evacuated. She managed to flee from Kharkov literally with the last train, and they lived with our family in Perm throughout the war.

On the photo you can see how beautiful she was. Her appearance was admired even by the actors of the Kirovsky Opera and Ballet Theater who were evacuated to Perm along with our family during the war.

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