The Memorial Book of Ostrow-Lubelski
I am dedicating this article to the memory of my late
brother Monia (July 19, 1928 -- September 14, 1945)
The aim of this article is to depict the history of Ostrow and its
Jewish community up to the Second World War and the Holocaust. The
article is based on information which can be found in history books
and encyclopedias. Unfortunately this information is scant since
Ostrow has never been a big town and no importent [sic] events are
known to have happened there.
Ostrow is located on a small river, Timenica, in the Lublin region,
some 35 km. to the north-east from Lublin. Around Ostrow there are
numerous peat-bogs. In the old times the whole area was covered by
big forests. Now only the Parczew forests situated between Ostrow
and Parczew are left. The town of Parczew is Ostrow's closest
neighbour, 16 km to the north. The other neighbouring town is
Lubartow, which is located 29 km. to west.
The history of the town
At the end of the XIIth century the place where the town of Ostrow is
located was quite near the eastern border of the Polish Kingdom. The
area's development was hampered by the invasion of the Mongols, who
destroyed most of the settlements there in the middle of the XIIIth
century. Only in the beginning of the XVth century did the town of
Lublin and its surroundings return to normal life. It is known that
at that time Ostrow already existed as a village where a wooden
Polish church was built soon after 1442. More than 110 years later,
on January 25, 1548, the Polish king Zygmunt I granted Ostrow the
status of a town. Ostrow also obtained from the king some other
privilages [sic], particularly the right to hold fairs on Saturdays.
The middle of the XVIth century, when Ostrow became a town, was a
time of fast development of the whole area around Ostrow. Five years
earlier than Ostrow, in 1543, the town of Lubartow was founded.
Ostrow's neighbour town, Parczew, which in our memory is a small
insignificant place, at that time played a remarkable role in Polish
history. It served as the seat of the sessions of the Polish
parliament (Sejm) and the scene of important negotiations between
Poland and Lithuania. In the previous XVth century a wooden royal
palace was built near Parczew. An organized Jewish community
existed in Parczew from the start of the XVIth century, and in 1566
there were about 60 Jews there.
Taking into account the small distance between Parczew and Ostrow,
we can assume that the first Jews came to Ostrow from Parczew,
most likely at the end of the XVIth or the beginning of the XVIIth
century. It was the time of relative prosperity of Polish Jews, who
were mostly protected by the Polish kings. This prosperity was
interrupted in the middle of the XVIIth century by the uprising of
Chmelnicki's Cossacks who killed tens of thousands of Jews in Ukraine
and South-east Poland. In 1648 most of the Lublin Jews were killed by
Polish peasants who called themselves by the name of "Cossacks". The
Ostrow Jews apparently escaped the killings.
During the XVIIth and XVIIIth centuries Polish kings granted
additional new rights to the Ostrow merchants. These rights
reflected the growth of the town as a local trade center. In 1660
the whole town was burnt down but this event could not hold up its
development for a long time. The first known number of Jews in
Ostrow dates from 1676. In that year there were 60 Jews in the town.
About 50 years later the area around Ostrow was severely damaged by
the Northern War between Russia and Sweden. Thus by 1718 only four
Jews remained in Parczew. We may assume that some of the Parczew
lews fled to Ostrow, which was not hurt by the war. The number of
Jews settled in Ostrow rapidly increased during the XVIIIth century.
In 1765 as many as 344 Jews lived in Ostrow a 500% increase compared
to 1676. The growth of the Ostrow Jewish community aroused the
anxiety of the local Polish authorities and on July 21, 1789 King
Stanislaw August restricted the liberties of the Ostrow Jews. This
restriction may be well associated with Ostrow's rise as a local
Catholic center. In 1755 a beautiful Roman-Catholic church was built
there. The church has remained until now the only real site of which
the town can be proud.
Polish rule in Ostrow ended in 1795 after the third (final) division
of the Polish Kingdom. From 1795 till 1815 Ostrow belonged to the
Austrian Empire. In 1815, after Russia defeated Napoleon, the whole
of central Poland was annexed to the Russian Empire. Russian rule in
Ostrow lasted exactly 100 years, until 1915.
Under Russian rule Ostrow was included into the newly-formed Siedlec
province. Correspondingly, the town's name was changed from "Ostrow
Lubelski" to ""Ostrow Siedlecki". According to the Jewish
encyclopedia published in Petersburg at the end of the XIXth century
"Ostrow... belongs to the places where the Jews long since have not
been restricted in their rights to settle there". In 1856 there were
851 Jews in Ostrow, 33% of the total population of 2579 residents.
In 1897 there were as many as 3221 Ostrow Jews, an increase of 278%
within 41 years. This increase cannot be explained by natural growth
alone so we have to suppose that in this period many Jewish families
came to Ostrow from other places. The Polish (Christian) population
was also inc
We know nothing important about Ostrow at the beginning of the XXth
century. It is known only that a Russian military unit waa stationed
in the town during the first Russian Revolution (1905--1907) and that
there was some revolutionary unrest among the soldiers. In the
summer of 1915, during the second year of World War One, Ostrow was
occupied by German troops, apparently without any battles at all.
The German occupation lasted until 1918. In Novembcr 1918 the Polish
state was proclaimed, and due to the new administrative division
Ostrow obtained again its old name -- "Ostrow Lubelski". According
to a census carried out in 1921 the number of Jews in Ostrow was no
more than 1267. This number demonstrated an importent decrease in
the Jewish Population of Ostrow in the period from 1897 to 1921. The
number of Christians (2546) also decreased, but by some 10% only.
The total population was 3813, and the Jews made up one-third. The
number of Jews in the villages around Ostrow was as following: Bobryk
-- 11, Drozdovka -- 11, Gleboki -- 16, Kolehovice -- 42, Krasne --
50, Zamiescie -- 17. Together with the Jewish residents of these
villages, Ostrow's Jcwish communily numbered 1414 Jews. Although the
natural growth of the Jewish population was relatively large at that
time, the number of Jews in Ostrow most probably was also decreasing
after 1921, as many Jews were leaving the town.
The 20s and 30s were years of high political activity among the
Ostrow lews, including the Zionist movement. It was also the time of
the beginning of the "aliya" of Ostrow Jews to Palestine (Mr.
Faiershtein was probably the first "oleh" from Ostrow). This period
of the Jewish life in Ostrow is well portrayed in the memories
publishd in the present book so we do not need to linger more on this
subject.
The Second World War and the Holocaust
On September 1, 1939 German troops invaded Poland and unleashed the
Second World War. Ostrow was located deep in the rear, so at the
beginning of the war people were afraid of air bombardments only.
Although German war planes indeed many times flew past Ostrow, they
fortunately did not find there anything worthy of a bomb. In the
middle of September the Germans were moving rapidly from the west to
Lublin and from north to Siedice and Wlodawa, approaching Ostrow.
The Polish line was formed by the army of General Przedzymirski some
20--40 km. from Ostrow. The Polish cavalry was concentrated in
Parczew, under the command of Ceneral Anders who became later famous
as the Commander-in-Chief of the Polish army in exile. On September
17 Lublin was taken and a cavalry brigade was moved from Parczew to
the south, apparently via Ostrow, in order to stop the German
advance. On the same day the Germans took the town of Wlodawa
located 60 km. to the east of Ostrow. However, Przedzymirski's
troops drove them away.
On September 17 the Soviet Union invaded Poland. This invasion
destroyed the Polish defence ability almost completely but it saved
the lives of many Jews who found the opportunity to escape from the
Nazis. Soviet troops were moving westwards without any serious
resistence and already on September 22 they were on the east bank of
the Bug, opposite the town of Wlodawa. Ostrow, as well as Parczew
and some territory around it, remained for almost a week free of
Gerrnan occupation in spite of the closeness of the German troops.
This delay in the German advance can be explained, at least partly,
by the resistence of the Polish troops. The last pocket of this
resistence was destroyed by the Germans, with some Russian
assistance, only on October 5. This battle, the last battle of the
German-Polish war, took place about 40 km. from Ostrow. Ostrow was
occupied by the Germans at the end of September.
From the very beginning of the German occupation the Polish Jews were
deprived of all their rights and exposed to severe persecutions. One
of the first actions was a forcible transfer ot the Jewish
population. In November 1939 Lubartow Jews were moved to Parczew and
Ostrow; later, however, thay returned home. At the end of 1939 the
Nazi leaders decided to move Jews from various territories to the
Lublin region, planning to make this a Jewish reservation. Many of
these Jews were settled in Ostrow. The plan to form the Jewish
reservation was abolished in the summer of 1940. The physical
destruction of the Polish Jews started in February 1942 in the Lublin
region. Among the first victims were Lublin Jews who on March 16
were dispatched to the death camp of Belzec. In the spring of 1942
the Germans began to move Jews from various occupied countries to the
Lublin area, either dirertly to the death camps, or to some ghettoes
On April 13 and 15, 1942 two trains With Slovakian Jews, mainly women
and children, arrived at Lubartow. 330 of these Jews were
immediately dispatched to Ostrow.
In the beginning of May 1942 a secret order was sent to all local
police commanders (Kreishauptmanns) to be prepared to deport Jews
from the small towns in the Lublin district. In his answer of May
19, 1942 Kreishauptmann Ziegenmayer recommended the deportation, in
the first place, of the Jews from six towns including Ostrow. The
number of Jews in Ostrow was indicated by Ziegenmaycr as amounting to
3062. This number probably includes 300 Slovakian Jews. Since in
1921 Jere were only 1267 Jews in Ostrow, we may suppose that in May
1942 most of the Jews in Ostrow were not of local origin.
Any further German orders concerning the fate of Ostrow Jews are
unknown to us. According to information provided by survivors, Jews
were moved from Ostrow to Lubartow in October 1942. On the way many
of them were killed. The Jews who reached Lubartow were most likely
deported together with the Lubartow Jews to the Sobibor and Belzec
death camps on October 11, 1942.
Ostrow Jews were sent to death at the time when the Nazi machinery
for the physical destruction of the Polish Jews was working at full
speed. Most of the Jews of such large cities as Warsaw, Cracow and
Lublin were already dead. They were killed mainly in the death camps
which were built in the spring of 1942 in the Lublin area, not so far
from Ostrow. In autumn 1942 the Ostrow Jews probably knew, at least
vaguely, these terrible facts.
It is doubtful that there were any contacts in Ostrow between the Jews
and the Polish underground movement and partisans, although the
conditions for these contacts were better than in many other towns.
The resistance movement in Ostrow and around it was extremely active.
The first resistance group was formed in Ostrow as early as the autumn
of 1940 (A. Respondek, a teacher) and more resistance groups were
formed in 1941--1942 (W. and K. Markiewicz, K. Sidor and etc);
most of Jem were connected with the Communist GL (Gwardia Ludowa).
The Parczcw forests located several kilometers from Ostrow served
as a partisan center beginning with the winter 1941-1942. We do not
know anything definite about the attitude of the Polish underground
movement in Ostrow toward Jews. Most probably the fate of Jews was
not of interest to them. This is well demonstrated by the testimony of
L. Doroszewski, who describes the underground organizations in Ostrow
and the situation there beginning from 1940 without mentioning Ostrow
Jews at all. However, talking into account the Communist background
of the most of the resistance groups, we can hope that they were at least
not hostile to the Jews.
The attitude towards the Jews of the partisans around Ostrow was
surely not negative. They were mainly Soviet soldiers who had fled
from German captivity. The first commander of these partisans was a
former Soviet officer, "David", (killed in a battle in 1943). His
real name is unknown but judging from his pseudonym he could have
been a Jew. In the spring of 1942 David's group joined 8 partisan
unit under the command of "Fiodor" (Theodor Albert), a former Soviet
officer of Polish origin. Fiodor cooperated later with Jewish
partisans.
The first battle of Fiodor's partisans took place in November 1942.
The partisans tried to beat off a German assault on a forest where a
group of Parczew Jews were hiding. Unfortunately the partisans were
forced to retreat, and most of the Jews were killed on the spot. On
December 17, 1942 the Fiodor unit captured the town of Ostrow,
killing a policeman and wounding a few others In the spring of 1943
the Jewish partisan unit of Chyl Grynszpan was formed, operating
mainly in the Parczew forests together with the Fiodor unit. In the
second half of 1943 and the beginning of 1944 Ostrow was under the
control of the Communist AL (Armia Ludowa). Only in April 1944 did
the Germans recapture Ostrow after a short battle. The Soviet troops
entered Ostrow on July 22, 1944.
Bibliography
English and German
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