Jakub Berkman was born on 13 December 1930 in Radom. His grandfather Berkman was an Orthodox Jew, owner of a kosher sausage factory in Radom. His father, Joel Mosze Berkman, was born in 1903; he received his father's consent to study at a junior high school and was the first in his family to graduate (from the Russian school in Radom); he had a sister and three brothers (according to age: Izrael, Mosze, Pola, Fiszek, Leon).
The family on the mother's side was from Suchedniów. His great-grandfather, Jankiel Warszawski, bought some land and built the first hydraulic mill in Suchedniów in the later Kielce province. His grandfather, Zelig Warszawski, built the largest sawmill in the district and lived in the centre of Suchedniów. His mother, Luba, had six siblings: Pola, Hertz, Cesia, Ester, Fajga, Jue. Jakub Berkman's parents met in Suchedniów, where his father came to buy the sawmill. On 1 January 1930 they got married and settled in Radom. They moved to Kielce in 1935, when his sister Celina was born.
Before the war Jakub Berkman completed two grades of primary school. In the summer of 1939, he and his parents went on holiday to Szczawnica, when they returned to Suchedniów, the war broke out. They escaped to the east, managed to reach Ostrów, but after the Russian aggression they returned to Suchedniów where they were detained by the Germans and their property was given to passers-by.
In 1942, a German newspaper informed them about the plans for the final solution of the Jewish question and they began to plan to go into hiding. With the help of Dr. Poziomski, families were found which agreed to hide the family in exchange for money (the property was at the disposal of Dr. Poziomski). The parents were to hide with an engineer, Leopold von Krauze. At the end of July 1942, Jakub Berkman (under the name of Jan Bogacki) and his sister were transported to Warsaw; his sister was placed in a Polish family and he was placed in a monastery in Zielonka. Then he stayed with a teacher, Magdalena (October-November), and then together with his parents with the engineer Krauze. His sister did not survive the war. He now lives in Israel. He visited Poland for the first time in 1992, when he found the graves of Poles who saved his family.