Jewish Emigration from Russia to Mongolia

(Jewish Telegraphic Agency Mail Service)

A considerable stream of Jewish emigration is proceeding of late from Soviet Russia by way of Harbin and Manchouli into Mongolia. Jews are settling in the Mongolian towns, Kobdo Maimaichen, and principally in Urga, the capital of the new Mongolian autonomous Republic. From Manchouli to Urga is a distance of over a thousand kilometres. The road goes all the way through the desert. In winter there is no regular communication because of the snow storms, which last winter caused much loss of life among the emigrants.

The first Mongolian settlement, Sambes, now contains 300 Jewish families. The road to the town is a dangerous one because of the bands of robbers which infest the neighborhood, remnants of the bands of the Attaman Semiunov. They often fall upon the Jewish emigrants going from Harbin and Manchouli to Mongolia, killing and robbing.

The Jewish emigrants who have gone from Harbin and Manchouli to Mongolia are gradually adapting themselves to the difficult conditions in the country. Most of them are engaging in trading, and risk a journey of 400 to 500 kilometres among the semi-savage inhabitants, returning with pelts of Mongolian wolves, foxes, ermine, etc. The Jewish emigrants have managed to master the Mongolian language and some are now settling in the more remote and outlying districts.

Congregation Ansche Chesed of New York, organized fifty years ago, and now located at Seventh and St. Nicholas Avenues and One Hundred and Fourteenth Street, has purchased a site for a new temple and community house.