Between  Joseph Helfand/Helford’s two wives bearing him twelve children on two different continents and Isaac Leib Kievitsky/Levin’s seven children borne all overseas but also by two different wives, keeping track of these families tends to set the head spinning.  In an effort to provide some relief, I hereby present Joseph Helford’s descendant tree and that of Lena’s grandmother, the Babushka (aka Isaac Levin’s mother.) I have eliminated all details in an effort to make the basic relationships clearer;  but of course many questions still linger in the murk.

For example:  where did David-Solomon Melnik come from?  I have found no other Melniks originating in Shemezeve, except of course for his four mostly ill-fated sons. (Apart from Beryl/Boris who survived the siege of Leningrad and went on to be a renowned chemist  in Moscow, David’s other three boys were all murdered either in the Shoah or before)  And yet he was the town’s Miller which is the very meaning of Melnik. Was he born into his name and job, in which case what happened to his siblings?  Of did he, the offspring of a milling family elsewhere, travel to Shemezeve. with its mill that needed a miller, and to Chaya Kievitsky who needed a man?