Print - The Canadian Jewish Heritage Network - Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives

Notes: Chaim Jegergarn was born in Janow Lubelski, Poland in 1912. He and his seven siblings were raised in a poor family. He did not go to school. At only ten years old, he learned to be a tailor. In 1935, he served in the Polish Army for 18 months. He got married in 1937. After Kristallnacht, he escaped with his family to Russia. From there they went to Lvov, Ukraine (Lwow, Poland), where Chaim registered to go to work in Selovalika ?, Russia, where he worked as a tailor. There, they were bombed so they moved by train to a small place in the woods near Yaroslavl. In 1941, he moved to Kozyatyn, Uzbekistan, to work in a factory. Chaim obtained a Russian pass and moved near Tashkent, where he stayed for nearly three years working in the coal mines. He contracted typhus and later worked as tailor in a factory. In 1945, he left Tashkent to return by train to Szczecin, Poland. Except for two brothers, the rest of his family in Poland perished during the Holocaust. From 1946 to 1948, Chaim stayed in a DP camp in Eschwege, Germany. In July 1948, Chaim came to Montreal with his wife, son, daughter, and brother in an effort to begin a new life.