Maurice (Morris) Grace was the son of Jossel and Liba Greisas and born in shtetel of Abele, near Rokiskis in the province of Paneveyze in Lithuania. His date of birth was 16 March 1897. Granddaughter Merle Grace recounts, “After the pogrom in Bialystok and SideIce, Morris’s parents decided to send a group of children away. A big group of Greisas children and their cousins, plus a few neighbours’ children started out on a journey to get away from where they grew up, because it was deemed unsafe. Josel and Lieba were too old to travel with them, and made the devastating decision to let the children go off by themselves. Morris was 12 when he started off with his siblings. The only thing he told us, was that his mother opened the insides of the jacket with a tiny needlework scissors and put some money in it.  Then she showed him how she sewed it closed again. She told him to use it only in an emergency.  He eventually used this money to get on a boat in England.”

 

His sister Faiga Winter (born 07/04/1910) and brothers Zalman (born 13/02/1899) and Abel settled in Brazil. We also see that an Aleksas Greisas arrived in Uruguay in 1896 from Lithuania. This was presumably a distant relative who had left Lithuania earlier. Based on the SA Jewish Rootsbank listings a Israel Greisas arrived in South Africa in 1929 on the Grantully Castle. He was a photographer.  The connection between the two is not clear. 

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Morris began at Geluk (probably with Elias Helfer) and then settled in Coetzersdam near Vryburg where he farmed and ran a local store. Merle Grace notes that his "general dealer named Coetzersdam Store. In this shop everything was sold, from a bath plug to a school uniform. At the one side of the store, Morris had a coffee table where he always invited people to sit and have a chat and a rest."

 

In 1936 he married Elie Elija Johanna Potgieter. Based on an oral history account by Joe Joffe - who was a good friend of his - Morris sought to have his wife converted. This did not however materialize. He maintained excellent social and business ties with the community and was very engaged in charity work.  Morris and Elie had three children, Shirley, Edwin (Eddy) and Nevil.

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Merle, daughter of Nevil Grace retells the story of how her grandfather was reunited with his siblings. "When Morris was a much older man, someone came into the store from Brazil. How this happened nobody knew. These people were travelling through South Africa. Morris told them the  story of the pogroms, and them fleeing to England, and the boat trip. This man said that he had friends whose story sounded exactly like Morris’ story. He contacted these people in Brazil, and one of them turned out to be his brother."Morris was beside himself. He applied for a visa, and travelled to Brazil almost immediately. By now, he was fully South African, speaking Afrikaans and English, and his brother was Portuguese speaking. In order to communicate, they spoke their childhood language: Yiddish. Morris came back on cloud 9 and went to visit this brother again."