Shtil, di nacht iz oysgeshternt,
Un der frost - er hot gebrent;
Tsi gedenkstu vi ich hob dich gelernt
Haltn a shpayer in di hent.
A moyd, a peltsl un a beret,
Un halt in hant fest a nagan,
A moyd mit a sametenem ponim
Hit op dem soynes karavan.
Getsilt, geshosn un getrofn
Hot ir kleyninker pistoyl,
An oto a fulinkn mit vofn
Farhaltn hot zi mit eyn koyl.
Fartog fun vald aroysgekrochn,
Mit shney-girlandn oyf di hor,
Gemutikt fun kleyninkn n'tsochn
Far undzer nayem, frayen dor.
Silence, the night is all be-starred
And the frost burned strong.
Do you remember when I taught you
To hold a machine-gun in your hands.
A lass, a fur jacket and a beret,
Holding a pistol tight in her hand,
A lass with a velvet face
Watches over the enemy's caravan.
Aimed, fired and - hit,
With her dear little pistol,
She stopped a car - a nice one full of arms -
With one bullet.
At daybreak, she crawled out of the woods
With snow garlands on her hair,
Encouraged by the precious little victory
For our new, free generation.
This song tells the story of three partisans who blew up a German military transport on the outskirts of Vila in 1942. The partisans engaged in this act were a girl (Vitke Kempner) and two boys (Itzik Matskevitsch and Moyshe Brause). Hirsh Glik based his song on the episode, though references to frost and snow were his embellishments. It is interesting to note the poet's use of three words, shpayer, nagan, pistoyl, to denote the same object, and automatic pistol. A former resident of the Vilno ghetto gave this explanation for the poet's license: "Shpayer was common in the Vilno region; nagan was the Russian word; pistoyl was the German term. The use of all three within one song demonstrated the presence of Jews from all over Europe, often herded together by the German occupationists within one ghetto, one concentration or death camp."
(Source: Voices of a People: The Story of Yiddish Folksong, Ruth Rubin, 1979)
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