David Gill
"Never forget!"
Name at birth
David Gildengorin
Date of birth
05/15/1912
Where were you born?
Where did you grow up?
Ostruk, Ukraine
Name of father, occupation
Benjamin Gildengorin,
Leather tanning
Maiden name of mother, occupation
Bela Tabachnik,
Homemaker
Immediate family (names, birth order)
Parents, Harry, David, Tzvi, Aaron, Faye
How many in entire extended family?
50
Who survived the Holocaust?
David and Harry
The Germans invaded, they rounded up Jews from the village and put them in a truck where they were gassed to death. They then forced all of the Jewish inhabitants of the village to dig a large pit into which they shot and killed them.
David saw the truck and what was going on, he and his cousin, Simon Tabachnik ran away. They separated at some point. David went by himself to Tashkent, Uzbekistan, met his wife there, Sophia. There is now a monument at the site of the mass grave.
David’s brother Harry was married before the war, had two little girls. His wife, her mother, and the two girls were hiding in a barn, Harry was elsewhere. The women were found by the Nazis, all were shot and killed. He eventually came to Detroit, his name changed to Gilmore. He and his wife had one son, Chuck Gilmore.
Where were you in the Former Soviet Union?
Fled to Tashkent, Uzbekistan
What DP Camp were you after the war?
Ashvagor by Kassel, Germany
Where did you go after being liberated?
Displaced Persons' (DP) Camp
When did you come to the United States?
1949
Where did you settle?
Sioux City, Iowa then Detroit, Michigan In 1949, David had a distant cousin living in Sioux City, Iowa who sponsored him to come to America. David got a job working as a butcher at the Swift Meat Company. After a time, he was harassed by other workers, resenting that he was a foreigner taking away an American job. His first cousin living in Detroit, Simon Tabachnik, who he ran away with, found him and persuaded him to move to Detroit. David worked for the Stallman Builders as a laborer. They saw that he could read a blueprint. He was trained to become a carpenter, and later became a builder himself. He helped construct homes during the housing boom after WWII, he built a 100-unit apartment complex in Walled Lake, MI
How is it that you came to Michigan?
Cousin, Simon Tabachnik from Detroit found him and convinced the family to move to Detroit, Michigan
Occupation after the war
Butcher, laborer, carpenter, builder
When and where were you married?
December 31, 1946
Spouse
Sophia Gill
Children
Benjamin Gill and Gussie Isler
Grandchildren
Danielle Gottsagen, Steven Gill, Aaron Isler, Mark Isler
What do you think helped you to survive?
Toughness and the will to survive
What message would you like to leave for future generations?
Never forget!
Interviewer:
Biography given by Gussie Isler, daughter
Interview date:
11/11/2021
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