Bethany tells her family's story

My grandmother and grandfather arrived at Ellis Island in 1908 and 1905, just as so many before and after them have done. Leaving behind all that they knew and with only a dream of a life they had never seen, they left Poland to come to America. My grandparents did not know each other in Poland. Both were born in the late 1880’s in Partitioned Poland: my grandmother, Agnes, under German rule and my grandfather, Stanislaw, under Russian rule.

My grandfather immigrated first around 1904 or 1905 to avoid being enlisted in the Imperial Russian Army when he turned 17. Family lore tells that my grandfather purchased his passage from a friend who desperately needed money and that he entered the country under that man’s identity. On the surface, this would appear a fair trade at the time: my grandfather needed passage and his friend needed money. In hindsight though, I wonder if the friend regretted his decision since 1905 heralded a violent period in Poland beginning with the Russian Revolution, followed in 1914 by World War I, then by a series of border conflicts and finally culminating in World War II. My grandfather’s hometown of Kalisz was one of the first cities destroyed in World War I. Out of roughly 68,000 citizens in 1914; only 5,000 remained in Kalisz a year later. My grandfather’s brother Josef stayed in Poland and was enlisted in the Imperial Russian Army in 1905. Although he survived many battles and corresponded with my grandfather for several years, correspondence stopped around 1920 when it was believed that Josef was killed during the Polish-Soviet War.

My grandmother left Germany/Poland during the summer if 1908 and arrived at Ellis Island aboard the SS President Lincoln on July 3, 1908. She would join her twin sisters and their husbands who had already left Poland for America, but would leave behind an infant daughter in the care of her mother until she got settled in her new home. Happily, she returned to Ellis Island to be reunited with her daughter following her marriage to my grandfather. My grandmother’s younger brother remained in Poland where he was served in the Polish Army and was killed during World War I. All remaining relatives were believed to be killed during World War II when her hometown of Poznan was incorporated into the Third Reich and many of its Polish citizens executed, arrested, or used as forced labor.

My grandparent’s life together in Albany was modest, but compared to life in Poland, America must have seemed the land of milk and honey. Here they owned their own home where they raised a family of five—three sons and two daughters. My grandfather worked as a mechanic at the West Albany rail yards earning enough so that his wife did not have to work outside of the house. Instead of growing crops for subsistence, my grandfather was a gardener with the luxury of growing roses and dahlias simply for their beauty.

From opposite sides of Poland they had traveled and in America they arrived. A boy from Russian/Poland and a girl from German/Poland. Had they not come, they would likely have been caught up on opposing sides of the war within a few years time. Instead they had the courage to break from all they knew and venture across the ocean to an unknown life and join . . . “ those courageous men and women who came to this country in search of personal freedom, economic opportunity and a future of hope for their families.” (Excerpt from the American Immigrant Wall of Honor)