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Read MoreLiubar
Lieber Tov (Yiddish), Ljubar, Luber, Lubar (Polish), Любар (Ukrainian), Любар – Liubar (Russian) Liubar is a small town on the Sluch River, about 60 km west of Berdychiv and 75 km southwest of Zhytomyr in Zhytomyr region. Majority of the text for this article was taken from the book of “Protecting Memory” project. The first Jews to settle in Liubar may have arrived as early as the 15th century, but their descendants fled the town during the peasant and Cossack uprising in the mid-17th century. Jews did not begin to return to Liubar until 1703. By 1765, the Jewish population had grown to 61, with another 100 Jews in the surrounding villages. Under the terms of the Second Partition of Poland in 1793, Liubar fell to the Russian Empire. There, the town formed a part of the Volhynia Gubernia. In 1847, the population of the Liubar Jewish Community numbered 3,770, a figure that included Jews in the nearby villages. However, according to the first and only census of the Russian Empire, the Jewish population of Liubar rose to 5,435 in 1897. Jews thus made up over 43 percent of the town’s population. In the early 1900s‘, the Jews of Liubar maintained a main synagogue and at least six study houses of learning. The main synagogue, a choral synagogue made of stone, was located near the river bank and dated around 1861. Map of the Liubar, 1897: On the eve of the First World War, the town had a Jewish hospital, a vocational school for Jewish men, a mutual aid society, and a school for Jewish orphans and poor children (Talmud Torah). The free professions (pharmacists, doctors, dentists), skilled crafts (carpenters, blacksmiths, tailors), and commerce (retailers for groceries, grain, building supplies, books, clothing, and manufactured goods) employed many Jews, but others were ordinary day labourers. One of the local photo studios and the print shop were Jewish-owned. Jews also owned the mead brewery and butter factory and, at the very least, held the lease on a local water mill. Map of the Liubar by Boris Degtyar (1922 – 2012): The secular Zionist movement, which pursued the dream of Jewish independence in Palestine, had also made inroads into Liubar before 1914. From September 28 to October 17 1920, the Jews of Liubar endured repeated violence carried out over several days during a three-week period by differing formations of the Red Army. The soldiers left 60 dead and 300 wounded in the first...
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Read MoreBelohirya
Belohirya is an urban-type settlement and the district centre in the Khmelnytskyi region. In 2011, the population was 5,483. The settlement is located along the Gorin River. Before 1946, the settlement was known as Lyakhovtsi. Lyakhovtsi was first mentioned in historical documents in 1441. From the 16th to 18th centuries, it was a city in the Kremenets County of the Volyn Voivodeship within the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. In 1793, Lyakhovtsi became a part of the Russian Empire. In the 19th to early 20th century, it was a shtetl in the Ostroh County of the Volyn Governorate. Much more information about Lyakhovtsi can be found in this website. In 1708, the Jews of Lyakhovtsi suffered greatly from raids by Cossack, Swedish, and Russian troops. Representatives of the Jewish population and the bourgeoisie declared on December 5, 1708, that the city had been destroyed. In 1867, there was a synagogue in Belohirya. In 1910, there was a public one-class Jewish elementary school with a crafts department, Talmud-Torah, and a private Jewish male school. I could not find information on the pogroms during the Russian Civil War, but by the 1910s, the town’s Jewish population had decreased by half. I couldn’t found information about Jews of Lyakhovtsi between the WWI and WWII. Holocaust The ghetto in Lyakhovtsi consisted of 2-3 streets on the outskirts of the town, enclosed by barbed wire. Prior to the war, it was the residence of the poorest Jews in Lyakhovtsi. Local Jews were already living in the ghetto, and Jews from Yampil and Kornitsa were also added. In total, there were more than 3,000 people in the ghetto. In the ghetto, prisoners were forced to wear armbands with the Star of David and to sew a yellow circle onto their clothing on their backs. Ida Kritman mentioned some other Jews who were with her in the ghetto in her interview: Anna Yakovlevna Kharakh, a Jewish woman, worked as a doctor at the local hospital. Some Jews were killed in the ghetto even before the mass shooting, including Hannah Kornblit, Izya Takhman, and the Karafin family, Haya and Ella. Their two sons were called up to the Red Army. Son Samuel was a scout and survived. After the war, he worked for the KGB in Zaporizhia. Many people died in the ghetto due to intolerable living conditions, hunger, and disease. On June 20, 1942, a policeman released Ida Kritman from the ghetto in exchange for a bribe in the form of a bicycle....
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Read MoreYampol
Yampol is a village in the Belogorie district of the Khmelnytskyi region. It should be distinct from Yampol in the Vinnytsia region, as these are two different places. In the 16th and 17th centuries, the village was called Yanushpol. So, likewise, it should be distinct from Yanushpol in the Zhytomyr region. More information about PreWWII Yampol can be found in Yampol memorial book. Yampol was part of the Volyn Voivodeship, Kremenets Powiat, during the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. In the early 18th century, the inhabitants of Yampol, including Jews, were devastated by the armies of Cossacks, Swedes, Poles, and Russians. In 1765, the population was 476. At the beginning of the 19th century, Yampol was part of the Volyn Province, Kremenets District. Information about the lives of Jews in Yampol in the 1930s-1940s was taken from a two-hour interview with a native of the village, Ida Kritman, which she gave for the Shoa Foundation project in 1994. From 1745 to 1755, Rabbi Yekhezkel Lando (Node BeYehuda) (1713-1793) headed the rabbinical court of Yampol. Then, in 1755, he was appointed the chief rabbi of Prague, a post he held for 38 years. In the second half of the 18th century, Rabbi Yekhiel-Mikhel from Zolochiv settled in Yampol – a disciple of Baal Shem Tov and Magid of Mezritch. He devoted himself entirely to the study of Torah, primarily Kabbalah. In addition, he led an extremely ascetic lifestyle: fasting from Sabbath to Sabbath and not leaving the Beit Midrash all week. Rabbi Yekhiel-Mikhel from Zolochiv died in 1786 and was buried in the old Jewish cemetery of Yampol. There was a Jewish hospital in the village. Jews owned all five grocery stores, all five tanneries, a store for roofing iron, both hardware stores, all six manufacturing shops, all three flour shops, all three stores for bags and sacks, all three bread shops, and a forest warehouse. After signing the peace treaty between Poland and the Soviet Union in 1921, Yampol became a border town, as the new border ran 3 km from the village. A large building was built in the village to house a border military unit. It is now used as a house of culture, with a store in the basement. In addition, the military unit’s parade ground is used as a rural stadium. The Jews mainly lived in the centre of the town. The town’s streets were not paved. Only the sidewalks were made of boards. In the 1920s, a...
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Read MoreTeofipol
Teofipol is a town in the Khmelnytskyi district of the Khmelnytskyi region. In 2013, the population was 7686 people. The Jews called this town Tshon. Several short stories about the Jews of Teofipol before the Revolution can be found here. During the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Teofipol was part of the Volhynian Voivodeship, Kremenets Powiat. Teofipol was under the influence of the Kremenets kahal. However, in 1758, a separate kahal was organized in Teofipol and Jews from surrounding villages were subordinated to it. In 1765, there were 516 Jews in Teofipol and the surrounding villages. In the Russian Empire, Teofipol was a town of the Starokostiantyniv district, Volyn province. In 1897 the Jewish population of 2,914 comprised 65 percent of the total population. There were (in 1910) a private Jewish boys’ school and a private Jewish girls’ school. The main occupations of the Jewish population were tailors, shoemakers, and small traders. Before the start of World War I, 3800 Jews were living in the village. Pogroms With the start of the Russian Revolution in 1917, Jews no longer felt safe as the central authority weakened. In 1918, a local Jew named Gersh Lichtgurten was killed near the village. On July 5, 1919, a pogrom was organized in the village by the 4th and 5th Tarashcha Soviet regiments and local peasants. As a result, 88 people were killed, 100 were wounded, 20 were maimed, and 65 women were raped. An epidemic of smallpox followed the pogrom, which claimed many lives. Most of the village’s industrial enterprises were destroyed. As a result of the pogroms, epidemics, and emigration, the Jewish population decreased by more than half and numbered 1450 people. Between the wars Under Soviets rule the town had a Jewish rural council and a Yiddish school. In 1929 a kolkhoz was founded; in 1936 it had 94 families. The synagogue was closed in 1934. In 1939 the Jews numbered 1,266, comprising 36.9 of the total population of the town. Holocaust Information about Holocaust in Teofipol was taken from Yad Vashem project website. The Germans occupied Teofipol on July 6, 1941. A ghetto was established (on the outskirts of town), where Jews from the village of Shibeno and other nearby villages were also held. Ghetto was located in current Makarenka Street. On January 21, 1942, about 500 Jewish men were shot to death by a German rural police unit. On the next day the remaining Jews of the ghetto – women, children, and...
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Read MoreKhmelnik
Khmelnik is a city and the administrative centre of the Vinnitskiy district. As of 2013, the population of the city was 28,217 people. Khmelnik is located on the Southern Bug River, dividing it into Old and New cities. The city was first mentioned in the chronicles in 1363. It was situated 6 km from the Black Road, used by Tatars and Turks during their attacks on Ukraine, and was a gateway to Podolia from the northeast. Therefore, Khmelnik gradually fortified itself, and by 1434, when it became part of Poland, it was a fortified castle with houses around it. In 1448, Khmelnik was granted the Magdeburg law. In 1793, Khmelnytskyi became part of the Podolian Governorate of the Russian Empire. In 1881, Khmelnytskyi had one of the largest Jewish communities in the Podolian Governorate. During the Civil War, a Jewish self-defence unit was organized in Khmelnik. Khmelnik entrepreneurs list from Russian Empire Business Directories by 1913: In the 1920s and 1930s, the Jewish National Council operated, and a school with instruction in Yiddish was in operation. In the late 1930s, all synagogues were closed, and Jews were forced to pray in private homes. There were two rabbis in the town. In 1935-1935, the only Jewish school in the city was closed, and teachers were repressed. In 1934, a unique therapeutic radon water was discovered in Khmelnik, which has no global analogues. Since then, many sanatoriums have been built in the city and declared a resort area. The 1939 census counted 4,793 Jews in Khmelnik, which constituted 64.8% of the total population. This number does not include the Jews of Ugrinovka, a village near Khmelnik (now part of the city). The Jewish population in the Khmelnik district numbered 810 people, most of whom lived in Ugrinovka. In 1939-41, Jewish refugees from Poland settled in Khmelnik. Polish refugees were housed in the former synagogue building. Overall, the Jewish population of Khmelnik and Ugrinovka was about 6,000 people by the summer of 1941. Part of the information for this article was taken from an interview with Israel Shvitelman, who survived the Khmelnik ghetto. In the 1990s, he gave an interview with the Shoa Foundation. Khmelnik in 1930s: This slideshow requires JavaScript. Holocaust When Soviet troops were retreating, German aviation heavily bombed the city. During the retreat, a bridge over the river Bug was blown up. Germans entered the city on June 17, 1941. The overwhelming majority of Jews could not evacuate and...
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Read MoreNovye Mlyny
Novye Mlyny is a village located in the Nezhin district of the Chernihiv region on the left bank of the Seim River. The population was 905 people as of 2006. During its prime, around 400 Jews were living in Novye Mlyny, and I am describing on this website shtetls where more than 1,000 Jews lived. However, in 2015, I accidentally purchased a book on Amazon called “Mother and Son” by Abram Vilcher. He describes in detail the Jewish town of Novye Mlyny in the early 20th century. The book’s author left the USSR in the 1920s and immigrated to the US with his family. Text from this book was used for this article. Also, there is possibly the last wooden synagogue in Ukraine. I visited the town during my expedition in 2020. Besides the synagogue building, no traces were left in the village of Jews having lived there. Wooden synagogue in Novye Mlyny: Early in the 19 century, a German engineer passing through the area had realized the commercial potential of building water mills along the banks of the Seim. He built five wooden dams some five hundred feet apart to create waterfalls, and at each site erected a mill to produce flour, edible oils, starch and sugar, using the vast agricultural produce of the surrounding villages. Thus the shtetle obtained its name: Noviye Mlini, new mills. At the close of the Nineteenth Century, a few Jewish families had settled in the township of Noviye Miini in the State of Chernigov in the Ukraine. By the year 1917, the Jewish community had grown to forty-five families, and during that period they experienced no organized acts of hostility. From time to time, there were incidents of harassment by government officials, acts which often occurred when the perpetrators were short of cash. The Jews kept these events at bay by bribery, a practice which eventually became routine. Noviye Mlini, a shtetle in the Ukraine, with a population of some two thousand souls and forty five Jewish families, had two main streets. One from the River Seim, leading from east to west, was known as Sosechnaya Ulitza, the paved street, although its bricks were buried under a cover of mud and sand. Along Sosechnaya Ulitza were lined small wooden buildings, mostly occupied by Jews, housing the stores and markets of the shtetle. Noviye Mlini was a county seat and the trading center of the surrounding villages. A second main street, running perpendicular, south...
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Read MoreDzyunkov
Dzyunkov, a village in the Pohrebyshchensky district of Vinnytsia region (Ukraine). Since 1793, it has been part of the Russian Empire. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Dzyunkov was a small town in the Berdychivsky district of Kyiv province. In 2022, I visited Dzyunkov in search of any traces of Jews in the village. Instead, the locals showed me the remains of a Jewish cemetery on the slope of a hill on the outskirts of the village with several stones. Also, in the middle of the village, there is a vast space where the Jewish houses used to be, in the middle of which is an entrance to an old cellar. According to the locals, the cellar was used by Jews as a refrigerator. Remains of old cellar, 2023: I was unable to find much information about the Jews of Dzyunkov. In 1865, there was a synagogue in Dzyunkov. From 1889, the rabbi of Dzyunkov was Shmuel-Yuda Dinin (1865-?). In 1910, the pharmacy was owned by Shevel Alperovich. Dzyunkov ceased to exist as a Jewish town during the Civil War of 1917-1920 when, due to numerous pogroms, Jews were forced to flee to other places. Local partisans organized the first pogrom on June 1, 1919. The partisans gathered Jews in the synagogue and demanded a contribution of 300,000 rubles from them. The Jews could only collect 50,000. Then the pogromists killed 35 people with swords. About forty Jews were seriously injured. Jewish population of Dzyunkov: 1847 – 373 Jews 1897 – 1137 (26%) The Sokolva gang organized the second pogrom in August 1919. They robbed the city and killed six Jews. In December, local hooligans attacked the town again. They looted shops and apartments and also killed four Jews. In February, a detachment of the Volunteer Army invaded the city. Immediately upon their arrival, they began to loot homes and shops, rape women, and beat and torture Jews who fell into their hands. They also killed Rabbi Chaim Dinin, 28, and Eliyahu Zinger, 24. In total, the Denikinists killed seven people. In March 1920, a local gang led by Strymetsky, 27, who served in the Petlyura army, invaded the city. He looted the city, killed ten Jews, and injured five. When wealthy Jews saw their lives in danger due to constant attacks and pogroms, especially after local robber Strymetsky began to attack the city very often, they left the town. They moved to Pohrebyshche, where there was organized...
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Read MoreBorshagovka
Borshagovka is a village located in Pohrebyshchenskyi district of Vinnytsia district, Ukraine. In 2022, approximately 500 people lived there. Borshagovka locates near the confluence of the Orikhovatka and the Ros Rivers. In 1793, after the second partition of Poland, Borshagovka became a part of the Russian Empire. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Borshagovka was a shtetls of the Skvira of Kyiv guibernia. Historically, the village was divided into three parts: Mestechko (the centre with a market square where Jews mostly lived), Sad, and Zarechye. Most of the information about the Jews of Borshagovka after the Revolution was obtained from an interview with a native of Borshagovka , Rakhil Karp, which she gave to the Shoa Foundation in the 1990s. Her entire family did not evacuate from the shtetl in 1941 and was executed in Pohrebyshche. In the summer of 2022, I visited a village in search of any traces of the Jews and found only the remains of a destroyed Jewish cemetery and a few fragments of tombstones. Borshagovka in 2020s: In 1708, on the orders of Hetman Mazepa, the general judge Vasily Kochubey and the Poltava colonel Ivan Iskra were executed in the village. In 1908, on the 200th anniversary of the execution, a monument made from black stone was erected in the centre of the village. This monument is the oldest architectural object here. In 1863, there was a synagogue in Borshagovka . From the 1880s, Rabbi Shlomo-Doyv-Ber Shapiro (1854–?) was the rabbi, followed by his son Yakov-Itskhok. After the 1861 reform, Count Rzhevusky, who owned most of the land around Borshagovka, leased it to a local Jew named Gabe. According to the laws of 1881, Jews were prohibited from owning land, and then wealthy local Ukrainians began to lease the county land. In the centre of the shtetl was a Jewish mikveh on the Ros River. In the early 20th century, thanks to the local Jewish community, a road was built connecting shtetls with Skvіra. Among the wealthy residents of shtetl, there were merchant Singer and his son-in-law Chernov, who were said to be millionaires. Pogroms Borshagovka ceased to exist as a Jewish village during the Civil War of 1917-1920 when, due to numerous pogroms, Jews were forced to flee to other places. From the memories of Rakhil Karp: The Sokolovsky gang request a considerable sum of money from Jews. Bandits took 25 hostages and locked them in the synagogue. Jews failed to...
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Borshagovka
Borshagovka is a village located in Pohrebyshchenskyi district of Vinnytsia district, Ukraine. In 2022, approximately 500 people lived there. Borshagovka locates near the confluence of the Orikhovatka and the Ros Rivers. In 1793, after the second partition of Poland, Borshagovka became a part of the Russian Empire. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Borshagovka was a shtetls of the Skvira of Kyiv guibernia. Historically, the village was divided into three parts: Mestechko (the centre with a market square...
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Shenderovka
Shenderivka is a village in the Korsun-Shevchenkivskyi district of Cherkasy region. It is situated on the right bank of the Ros River, near its confluence with the Borovytsia River. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Shenderivka was a shtetl in Kaniv County of Kyiv Governorate. Information about the Jews of Shenderovka for this article was collected for over 30 years by Klavdiya Kolesnikova, the director of the Jewish museum in Korsun. The first written mention of the village...
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Steblev
Steblev is an urban-type settlement in the Korsun-Shevchenkivskyi district of the Cherkasy region. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Steblev was a shtetl in the Kanev county of Kyiv province. Information about the Jews of Steblev for this article was collected over more than 30 years by Klavdiya Kolesnikova, the director of the Jewish Museum in Korsun. I visited Steblev in the summer of 2020 but could not find any information about the Jews in the town. Of...
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Yanushpol
Yanushpol (until 1946, known as Ivanopol) is an urban-type settlement located in the Chudnivsky district of the Zhytomyr region. I visited Yanushpol during my expedition in the summer of 2020. The local history teacher, Alona Hroza, shared with me many facts about the Jewish community of the village. Additionally, much of the information for this article was taken from an interview with Semion Bekker, born in 1935, which he gave to the Shoa Foundation project in Mariupol in 1998....
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Salnytsya
Salnytsya is a village in Khmelnytskyi district of Vinnytsia Oblast in Ukraine. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, it was a shtetl of Litin County of Podolia Governorate. Jews called the village “Solchev” in Yiddish. Most of the information for this article was taken from the book “Roads of Memory” by Faina Braverman, a native of Salnytsya (1923, Salnytsya – 2003, Kyiv), which I accidentally bought in 2019. Parts of this book can be found here. A lot...
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Ulanov
Ulanov is a village in the Khmelnitsky district of the Vinnitsa region. According to the 2001 census, the population of Ulanov was 3,038. From the 19th – early 20th centuries, Ulanov was a shtetl in the Litinsky district of the Podolsk province. Translated by Daniel Pesin. I visited Ulanov in 2020, I managed to talk with Yadviga Stepanovna Mikolyuk, born in 1928, who lived all her life near Jews and remembered a lot. I did not manage to find...
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Bazar
Bazar is a village in the Korosten district of the Zhytomyr region. In the early 1980s, about 2,500 people lived here, but most of the population left after the Chornobyl disaster. As of 2019, 573 people lived in Bazar. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Bazar was a town in the Ovruch district of the Volyn province. During the Soviet period, Bazar was a district centre until 1956. From 1956, it was a village in the Malyn district,...
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