A few hundred mourners gathered in the frigid cold Monday morning for a funeral for a 94-year-old Holocaust survivor said to have left behind more than 2,500 descendants.
Yitta Schwartz A”H, who died about 6 a.m. on Monday morning at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan, is thought to have had the largest extended family of anyone in the generation of Orthodox Jews from Eastern Europe who escaped annihilation by the Nazis during World War II.
Unlike most survivors, Schwartz and her late husband, Yosef, left their native Hungary with their family intact. They came to the United States with eight children and added nine more in the years to come, one of whom passed away as a child.
Schwartz left Williamsburg, Brooklyn, in 1978 after her husband died and settled in Kiryas Joel. At the time, she already had more than 170 grandchildren.
By the time of her death, her grandchildren had grandchildren.
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7 Responses
Netzach Yisroel lo y’shaker!
A vivid illustration of what was lost in the Holocaust.
I, as a Jewish mother, am inspired. May we all be fortunate enough to build our nation properly.
a few hundred mourners and 2500 descendants?
i dunno, but something doesnt add up right here!!! were the other grandchildren living far away?
People knew her as an exceptional woman, full of yiras shomayim and good middos.
#4- Likely her decendants live in many places. Travel with large families isnear impossible, unless you own a personal mini-bus.
Funnerals are held almost always immediately within a few hours. Not enough time to even let all her clan know.
Kol HaKavod Immale! Baruch Dayan HaEmet.
to the nazis yemach shemom v’zichrom – mir vellen iberleben!!!