Letter handwritten and signed by R. Chaim Ozer Grodzinski. Vilna, 27th Cheshvan [November 9] 1939.

Addressed to R. Yechezkel Abramsky, a rabbi in London and an intimate associate of his. Most of the letter deals with rescue efforts for the yeshivas that were exiled to Vilna and independent Lithuania (at the outbreak of World War II, many yeshivas fled Poland, which had been occupied and partitioned by the Germans and Russians, for Vilna and other cities in independent Lithuania, at the instruction of R. Chaim Ozer). During that turbulent time, R. Chaim Ozer assisted the leaders of the wandering yeshivas while taking care of their sustenance, doing everything to provide for their needs. The exiles to Vilna (mentioned in the present letter) included R. Yitzchak Ze'ev Soloveitchik, the Brisker Rav (who reached Vilna with some of his family members and students, who escaped and immigrated with him to Jerusalem in 1941); the Kamenets yeshiva and R. Baruch Ber Leibowitz (d. in Vilna, 5th Kislev 1939; his family escaped with some of his students and immigrated to the United States and Eretz Israel); the Mir yeshiva; the Radin yeshiva; the Baranavichy yeshiva and R. Elchanan Wasserman; the Kletsk yeshiva and R. Aharon Kotler; and others.

This historical letter recounts the situation in Vilna in those early days of the war; the concerns about Germany and Russia, who conquered Poland while hiding their plans; and on the exile of the yeshivas and rabbis who escaped to Vilna. He states that all the yeshivas arrived unharmed, but that the future is still unclear.

The beginning of the letter appears to be in scribal writing [in handwriting similar to R. Chaim Ozer's], while the last nine lines, about payments made on R. Abramsky's behalf, are handwritten and signed by R. Chaim Ozer.

R. Chaim Ozer Grodzinski (1863-1940) was a foremost rabbi of his generation and leader of European Jewry. He was the son of R. David Shlomo Grodzinski Rabbi of Iwye. He was renowned from his childhood for his exceptional brilliance. He entered the Volozhin yeshiva at the young age of 11, and became a disciple of R. Chaim of Brisk. At the age of 24, he was appointed rabbi and posek of Vilna, succeeding his father-in-law R. Eliyahu Eliezer Grodnansky, a posek in Vilna (son-in-law of R. Yisrael Salanter). He assumed the yoke of public leadership from a young age, and his opinion was conclusive on all public issues which arose throughout the Jewish world for close to fifty years.

The recipient of the letter,
R. Yechezkel Abramsky (1886-1976), was a confidant and agent of R. Chaim Ozer of Vilna ever since developing close ties with him in his youth while studying under his influence in Vilna. In winter of 1806, the "prodigy of Masty" Yechezkel Abramsky was forced to leave the Telshe yeshiva and flee to Vilna (then under Polish rule) to avoid conscription to the Russian army. In Vilna he was accepted into the Ramailes yeshiva and joined the elite class of students who attended the advanced lectures of R. Chaim Ozer (based on Melech BeYofyo, pp. 29-33).

While subsequently serving as Rabbi of Smilavichy and Slutsk, he served often as R. Chaim Ozer's agent in various communal affairs. R. Abramsky smuggled the manuscript of Part I of his Chazon Yechezkel from Slutsk to his teacher R. Chaim Ozer in Vilna, who was involved in its publication in Vilna, 1925.

When R. Abramsky was arrested by the Soviets and sent to Siberia in 1930, R. Chaim Ozer made every possible effort to release him. After his release in 1931, R. Chaim Ozer and the Rebbe Rayatz of Lubavitch joined with R. Abramsky to initiate the project of sending Pesach flour and food packages to Jews under the Bolshevik regime in Russia. Likewise, R. Abramsky was active on missions for R. Chaim Ozer for yeshivas in Poland and Lithuania and for rabbis of Europe. They also cooperated on many public issues, including the struggles for Jewish marriage and against the anti-Semitic laws in Germany and Europe forbidding Jewish shechitah (requiring stunning animals before slaughtering, which renders the meat non-kosher), and on rescue activity for rabbis and yeshivas who fled as refugees to Vilna at the start of the Holocaust. The present letter reflects some of their cooperation to rescue and provide for rabbis and yeshiva students in exile, who continued to study Torah even under those harsh conditions.

[1] leaf. Official stationery. 29 cm. Written on both sides. Good condition. Stains and folding marks.