Rav Yitzchak Eizik Hirshovitz
Born 1870 in Libau, he learned in Telz and then Volozhin, and was taken as a son-in-law by Rav Eliezer Gordon, marrying his daughter Chana Keila Rachel (the “Hena Kaila” of the family testimony, b. 9 Av תרכט; married 8 Kislev תרנא) - a third documented Gordon son-in-law alongside Rav Yosef Yehuda Leib Bloch and Rav Zalman Sorotzkin. The relationship stands in print on the machon’s own title page of Miteiv Higayon: חתן מרן הגאון רבי אליעזר גורדון.
He served as rav of Talsi and later of Virbalis on the Lithuanian-German border. Between the wars he carried the Aihumen/Smilovitz yeshivos alone after Rav Elchonon Wasserman left in 1921, staying until the last talmidim were smuggled out. He declined the Frankfurt kehilla’s approach to succeed Rav Shlomo Zalman Breuer. Devoted to Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch’s writings, he rendered them into Hebrew - Miteiv Higayon (Vilna 1913, with a letter of praise from Rav Chaim Ozer Grodzenski; reprinted by Machon Prei Eitz Chaim in 2026). He kept a speech-fast from Elul through Yom Kippur. He was murdered on 6 Av 5701 / 1941 at Uzventis with nine other rabbis, after fleeing to the Kelm Talmud Torah; his bones were reinterred in a Vilna mass grave on Tzom Gedaliah 1956.
His children
Six sons and three daughters. The best known: Rav Avrohom Shmuel Hirshovitz, the Illui of Tultchin - he transcribed Rav Yosef Yehuda Leib Bloch’s shiurim (printed in Shiurei Daas), served as rosh yeshiva of Torat Chesed in Baranovich from 1927 until the Shoah, then as ram at Chachmei Lublin after Rav Meir Shapiro’s passing; his talmidim include Rav Sholom Noach Berezovsky, later the Slonimer Rebbe. He was murdered with his whole family in 1943. The family’s sole survivor, R’ Yehuda Leib Hirshovitz of Bnei Brak, published his father’s writings as Kerem Beis Yisrael, whose front matter lays out the whole family.