United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Theodor Alexandrovich Sirkis (1913-1997) was born in a Black Sea port town near Odessa (Kyastitsa?). His wife, Frida Berkovna Gore (1920-1976) was born in Orhei, a small town near Kishinev (Chișinău). They met in Iasi in 1939 while studying medicine at the university. In November 1941 the family was evacuated from Moldova to Salsk (Rostov oblast) and Tyulkubas (Kazakhstan). Theodor, Frida, and Frida’s father Berko (Beryl) Srulevich Gore arrived in Kazakhstan, but Theodor’s and Frida’s five month old daughter Miriam died of dehydration and hunger en route. In Kazakhastan, Theodor worked as head of one of the district hospitals. Frida’s mother Malka and her brother Sioma (Shlomo) did not evacuate because Sioma was sick with tuberculosis and could not be transported. They hoped to hide in the village of Checholteni (?) near Orhei but were murdered there in 1941 by members of the local community and local police. Frida and Theodor returned to Moldova after the war, and Frida wrote a letter to the chief of the NKVD demanding justice for her mother and brother, but Theodor convinced her not to mail the letter. Theodor’s father and mother (d. 1947) survived the war in or near Bravicea, Moldova, and his brother (b. 1923) survived ten years in a gulag. Eleanora and her sister Malvina were born in 1945 and 1947. Eleonora immigrated to the US in 1995. Her sister Malvina remained in Russia.
folder 1
The Sirkis family papers are arranged as a single series.
The Sirkis family papers include records and photographs documenting Theodor and Frida Sirkis and their relatives in Moldova and Kazakhstan during the Holocaust. Documents include Theodore Sirkis’ Iasi student identification card, records documenting the evacuation of members of the Sirkis family to Salsk (Rostov oblast) and Tyulkubas (Kazakh SSR) in 1941, and a letter Frida composed but never mailed to the NKVD demanding justice for her mother and brother. Five photographs depict members of the Sirkis and Gore families and Theodore Sirkis with medical staff in an identified location.
Sirkis family papers