Esfir (Ester, Etia) Efimovna Morgenshtern (Morgenstern), nee Idel’chik, was born on April 8, 1923, in Minsk, Belorussia, U.S.S.R. to Inessa and Khamin Idel’chik. During the war she was interned in the Minsk ghetto from 1941 to 1943. After escaping the ghetto, she went into hiding under the false name Zinadia Goriunova, and in December 1943 joined the Parkhomenko partisan detachment of the Chapaev partisan brigade in the Baranovichi district, a Jewish partisan unit. She was also associated with partisan Group 106, also known as the Zorin Unit, named for its commander Shalom Zorin. The Zorin Unit was a Jewish partisan unit that broke off from the original unit in the Parkhomenko area. The unit grew from 60 men to over 800 people and included the Zorin Family Camp, which was made up of a hospital, school, weapons repair and bomb production shop, and other infrastructure needed to support the partisan members and the others hiding with them in the Naliboki Forest. She was liberated by the Soviet Red Army in July 1944 in Minsk. She later married Aron Morgenstern and had two children, Boris and Inessa.

Edited from Ester Morgenstern, interviewed by Natasha Poselski, USC Shoah Visual Testimony Archive, October 11, 1996.