History of Sorts

Rabbi Chaim Nussbaum was born in Lithuania, but  grew up in Scheveningen in the Netherlands.  His story in World War 2 is a remarkable, some people just have a very strong life force.

After he got  married  he returned, together with his wife, to his country of origin, Lithuania. When the Nazis invaded Lithuania in 1941,he  managed to escape with his family.

H reached Java in the Dutch East Indies via Via Russia and Japan . In  the Dutch East Indies (nowadays known as Indonesia) he became Rabbi of the Jewish communities of Batavia and Bandung.

In 1943, the Japanese occupiers of the Dutch East Indies, imprisoned  him in the Changi Prisoner of War Camp in eastern Singapore.

There  he was forced to work to do slave labor on the notorious Burma Railway. Chaim also took up a role  as the rabbi for the Jewish prisoners in the camp, and …