Adolf Rotenberg was born in 1915 in Odessa, in the family of a pharmacist.
At the age of fifteen, Rotenberg graduated from the piano class of the Odessa Musical school, but three years later he suddenly changed his profession, beginning to work as a technician at a shipbuilding plant. The next year, he enrolled in the Odessa Institute for Water Transport Engineers. He graduated from it in 1939, and left Odessa to work in the Russian Far East. In 1940, he returned to his native city and found a position in the administration of the Black Sea Shipping Company, while also working as a soloist for the radio.
Following the outbreak of the Soviet-German War, Rotenberg, in the rank of lieutenant, was one of the many Jews who took part in the defense of Sevastopol (in general, Jews were overrepresented in the artillery corps). He served in the Guards Division of the coastal defense. When the commander of his battery was killed, Rotenberg took over the command and organized the defense of Sevastopol from the shore. In the winter of 1942, his division successfully repelled a naval assault by the Axis invaders, causing the enemy to attack from the land. The Nazi advance was halted, and the Siege of Sevastopol began. In the heavy battles of June 1942, Rotenberg had to stay at the spotting post around the clock, correcting the fire of the battery. He was shell-shocked and wounded, but did not leave his post, and continued to carry out his combat mission. In the end, the Nazi assault was repulsed. Later, despite the high risk of being taken captive, Rotenberg personally carried out the detonation of the battery, to prevent the guns from falling into enemy hands. Adolf Rotenberg happened to be one of the last defenders of Sevastopol. As indicated in his letter of commendation, Rotenberg showed exceptional bravery, courage, and determination. In December 1942, he was awarded the Order of the Red Star and sent to the rear, where he was retrained as a theater director. In 1943-1944, he worked as a director at the theater of the Main Political Department of the Black Sea Fleet.
His father perished in Odessa during the Nazi occupation. His mother Berta survived. Adolf had two brothers, both of whom fought in World War II. The eldest brother, Grigory, was severely wounded, and died in 1944. The third brother, Moisei, was an engineer.
After the war, Rotenberg worked for a brief time as a director at the Odessa Opera and Ballet Theater. He then enrolled in the Special Air Force School and worked as a teacher in a training company. Shortly thereafter, he was transferred to the Pedagogical Institute, where he taught music and singing. From 1954, Rotenberg worked as director of the Odessa Philharmonic. Rotenberg's exact date of death is unknown, but he was still alive in 1985, when he was awarded the Order of the Patriotic War.
Moisei Rotenberg, Adolf's older brother, was born in 1906. He also took part in the defense of Sevastopol, in the rank of captain-engineer, and was wounded. Like his brother, he was an artillery spotter, and the two served in the same brigade. In 1943, he was awarded the order of the Red Star.
Related Resources
An essay about Rottenber brothers
The renowned military correspondent and writer Semyon Gecht dedicated an essay to Adolf and Moisei Rotenberg. Gecht depicted the heroism of the defenders of Sevastopol by focusing on the frontline exploits of the two brothers. At the same time, Gecht, who wrote his essay for the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee, shows not only the closeness between the two brothers, but also the high esteem in which they were held by their non-Jewish comrades in the division (whose ethnicities can be deduced from their Ukrainian, Russian, and Georgian names).
Two brothers – Moisei and Adolf Rotenberg – fought against the Germans in Sevastopol. The third brother was also a frontline fighter, but he was serving somewhere far away, and they knew nothing of him as they battled the enemy side by side, in the same battery. Both had been civil engineers before the war, and both volunteered for frontline duty on its very first day, becoming artillery spotters; they found themselves in the same battalion, the same battery, the same turret. The younger brother, Adolf, was the turret commander, while the elder brother, Moisei, was his assistant.… In May 1942, with the beginning of the second siege of Sevastopol during this war, the brothers assumed permanent posts. The younger brother took up position on elevation 120.1, while the elder picked a spot on Sapun Mountain. The Germans were preparing to storm the city, and the battery was expecting an assault any day now. The enemy threw the might of his air force at Sevastopol, dropping forty trainloads of ammunition in the course of three days. Ten thousand heavy bombs a day, tens of thousands of shells. Everything indicated that the battery would play a special role in these days, and its "eyes" had to be preserved at all costs. The eyes of a battery are its spotting posts, and the enemy was trying to destroy them first. The Rotenbergs had to stay at their posts twenty-four hours a day. The storming could begin any moment now, and on July 7 the battery was notified that the enemy was going on the offensive. The sky over the Red Army positions darkened, and German aircraft furiously pummeled the eyes of the battery, dropping hundreds of bombs upon them. The verdant Sapun Mountain, where the elder brother was stationed, became a desert. It was seemingly turned inside out; the limestone strata were exposed by the blasts and blackened by fire and smoke. The elder Rotenberg had to change posts three times, following direct hits, whereas the younger Rotenberg remained at the same post throughout the battle.
From: Semyon Gecht. The Rotenberg Brothers, GARF: f. Р-8114. op. 1. d. 22. p. 247.
