Lublin Ghetto
Encyclopedia
The Lublin Ghetto was a World War II ghetto created by Nazi Germany
in the city of Lublin
in occupied Poland, on the Nazi-administered territory of the General Government
. Its inhabitants were mostly Polish Jews
, although a number of Roma were also present. The Lublin Ghetto, set up in March 1941, was one of the first Nazi-era ghettos in occupied Poland
to be "liquidated". In November 1942 around 30,000 inmates were delivered to their deaths in cattle trucks at the Bełżec extermination camp and additional 4,000 at Majdanek
.
Odilo Globocnik
(the SS
district-commander who also set up the nearby Jewish reservation
), began to move the Lublin Jews away from his staff headquarters and into a new area set up for this purpose. Ten thousand Jews had been expelled from Lublin to the rural surroundings of the town in early March.
The Ghetto, referred to as the Jewish quarter
or Wohngebiet der Juden, was opened on March 24, 1941. The expulsion and ghettoization of Jews was decided in early March when the Wehrmacht
troops, preparing for the invasion of the Soviet Union
, needed housing close to the Nazi-Soviet demarcation line
. The Ghetto, the only one in the Lublin district in 1941, was located around the area of Podzamcze
, from the Grodzka Gate (at the time called the "Jewish Gate", as it demarcated
the boundary between the Jewish and non-Jewish quarters of the city), along the Lubartowska and Unicka streets, until the boundary of the Franciszkańska Street. Various members of Jewish political parties, such as the Bund
, were imprisoned in the Lublin Castle
and continued to carry out their activities underground.
At its creation the ghetto imprisoned 34,000 Jews and an unknown number of Roma. Virtually all of them were dead by the war's end. Most of them, about 30,000, were deported to the Belzec extermination camp
(some of them through the Piaski
ghetto) between March 17 and April 11, 1942; the German set quota called for 1,400 people per day to be sent to their deaths. The other 4,000 people were first moved to the Majdan Tatarski ghetto (a second ghetto established in the suburb of Lublin) and then either killed there or sent to the nearby Lublin concentration camp
. The last of the Ghetto's former residents still in German captivity were executed at Majdanek and Trawniki
camps in the Operation Harvest Festival (German: Aktion Erntefest) on November 3, 1943. At the time of the liquidation of the ghetto, the German propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels
wrote in his diary "The procedure is pretty barbaric, and not to be described here more definitely. Not much will remain of the Jews."
After liquidating the Lublin Ghetto, German authorities employed a forced labor work force of inmates of Majdanek to demolish and dismantle the area of the former ghetto, including in the nearby village of Wieniawa
and the Podzamcze district, and in a symbolical event blew up the Maharam's Synagogue
(built in the 17th century in honor of Meir Lublin
). In that way they erased several centuries of Jewish culture and society in Lublin – the Jewish population in 1939 was about a third of the town's total population.
A few individuals managed to escape the liquidation of the Lublin Ghetto and made their way to the Warsaw Ghetto
, bringing the news of the destruction with them. The eyewitness evidence convinced some Warsaw Jews that in fact, the Germans were intent on exterminating the whole of the Jewish population in Poland
. However, others, including head of the Warsaw
's Judenrat
, Adam Czerniaków
, at the time dismissed these reports of mass murders as "exaggerations". In total, only 230 Lublin Jews survived the German occupation.
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
in the city of Lublin
Lublin
Lublin is the ninth largest city in Poland. It is the capital of Lublin Voivodeship with a population of 350,392 . Lublin is also the largest Polish city east of the Vistula river...
in occupied Poland, on the Nazi-administered territory of the General Government
General Government
The General Government was an area of Second Republic of Poland under Nazi German rule during World War II; designated as a separate region of the Third Reich between 1939–1945...
. Its inhabitants were mostly Polish Jews
History of the Jews in Poland
The history of the Jews in Poland dates back over a millennium. For centuries, Poland was home to the largest and most significant Jewish community in the world. Poland was the centre of Jewish culture thanks to a long period of statutory religious tolerance and social autonomy. This ended with the...
, although a number of Roma were also present. The Lublin Ghetto, set up in March 1941, was one of the first Nazi-era ghettos in occupied Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
to be "liquidated". In November 1942 around 30,000 inmates were delivered to their deaths in cattle trucks at the Bełżec extermination camp and additional 4,000 at Majdanek
Majdanek
Majdanek was a German Nazi concentration camp on the outskirts of Lublin, Poland, established during the German Nazi occupation of Poland. The camp operated from October 1, 1941 until July 22, 1944, when it was captured nearly intact by the advancing Soviet Red Army...
.
History
Already in 1940, before the actual ghetto was opened, the SS and Police LeaderSS and Police Leader
SS and Police Leader was a title for senior Nazi officials that commanded large units of the SS, of Gestapo and of the regular German police during and prior to World War II.Three levels of subordination were established for bearers of this title:...
Odilo Globocnik
Odilo Globocnik
Odilo Lotario Globocnik was a prominent Austrian Nazi and later an SS leader. He was an acquaintance of Adolf Eichmann, who played a major role in the extermination of Jews and others during the Holocaust...
(the SS
Schutzstaffel
The Schutzstaffel |Sig runes]]) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Built upon the Nazi ideology, the SS under Heinrich Himmler's command was responsible for many of the crimes against humanity during World War II...
district-commander who also set up the nearby Jewish reservation
Nisko Plan
The Nisko Plan, also Lublin Plan or Nisko-Lublin Plan , was developed in September 1939 by the Nazi German Schutzstaffel as a "territorial solution to the Jewish Question"...
), began to move the Lublin Jews away from his staff headquarters and into a new area set up for this purpose. Ten thousand Jews had been expelled from Lublin to the rural surroundings of the town in early March.
The Ghetto, referred to as the Jewish quarter
Jewish quarter (diaspora)
In the Jewish Diaspora, a Jewish quarter is the area of a city traditionally inhabited by Jews. Jewish quarters, like the Jewish ghettos in Europe, were often the outgrowths of segregated ghettos instituted by the surrounding Christian authorities. A Yiddish term for a Jewish quarter or...
or Wohngebiet der Juden, was opened on March 24, 1941. The expulsion and ghettoization of Jews was decided in early March when the Wehrmacht
Wehrmacht
The Wehrmacht – from , to defend and , the might/power) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the Heer , the Kriegsmarine and the Luftwaffe .-Origin and use of the term:...
troops, preparing for the invasion of the Soviet Union
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II that began on 22 June 1941. Over 4.5 million troops of the Axis powers invaded the USSR along a front., the largest invasion in the history of warfare...
, needed housing close to the Nazi-Soviet demarcation line
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, named after the Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov and the German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, was an agreement officially titled the Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Soviet Union and signed in Moscow in the late hours of 23 August 1939...
. The Ghetto, the only one in the Lublin district in 1941, was located around the area of Podzamcze
Podzamcze, Lublin County
Podzamcze is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Bychawa, within Lublin County, Lublin Voivodeship, in eastern Poland. It lies approximately north of Bychawa and south of the regional capital Lublin.-References:...
, from the Grodzka Gate (at the time called the "Jewish Gate", as it demarcated
Demarcation
Demarcation is the act of creating a boundary around a place or thing.Demarcation may also refer to:*Demarcation line, a temporary border between the countries...
the boundary between the Jewish and non-Jewish quarters of the city), along the Lubartowska and Unicka streets, until the boundary of the Franciszkańska Street. Various members of Jewish political parties, such as the Bund
General Jewish Labour Bund in Poland
The General Jewish Labour Bund in Poland was a Jewish socialist party in Poland which promoted the political, cultural and social autonomy of Jewish workers, sought to combat antisemitism and was generally opposed to Zionism.-Creation of the Polish Bund:...
, were imprisoned in the Lublin Castle
Lublin Castle
The Lublin Castle is a medieval castle situated in Lublin, Poland, adjacent to the Old Town district and close to the city center. It is one of the oldest preseved Royal residencies in Poland, established by king Casimir II the Just.-History:...
and continued to carry out their activities underground.
At its creation the ghetto imprisoned 34,000 Jews and an unknown number of Roma. Virtually all of them were dead by the war's end. Most of them, about 30,000, were deported to the Belzec extermination camp
Belzec extermination camp
Belzec, Polish spelling Bełżec , was the first of the Nazi German extermination camps created for implementing Operation Reinhard during the Holocaust...
(some of them through the Piaski
Piaski
Piaski , formerly Piaski Luterskie, is a town in Poland at the Giełczew river. The town's population is about 2,660 . Administratively it belongs to Powiat of Świdnik of the Lublin Voivodeship. It lies 16 km Southeast of Świdnik.- History :...
ghetto) between March 17 and April 11, 1942; the German set quota called for 1,400 people per day to be sent to their deaths. The other 4,000 people were first moved to the Majdan Tatarski ghetto (a second ghetto established in the suburb of Lublin) and then either killed there or sent to the nearby Lublin concentration camp
Majdanek
Majdanek was a German Nazi concentration camp on the outskirts of Lublin, Poland, established during the German Nazi occupation of Poland. The camp operated from October 1, 1941 until July 22, 1944, when it was captured nearly intact by the advancing Soviet Red Army...
. The last of the Ghetto's former residents still in German captivity were executed at Majdanek and Trawniki
Trawniki concentration camp
Trawniki concentration camp, in the village of Trawniki about 40 km southeast of Lublin in Poland, was an SS labour camp which provided forced labourers for a nearby industrial plant to work in appalling conditions with little food...
camps in the Operation Harvest Festival (German: Aktion Erntefest) on November 3, 1943. At the time of the liquidation of the ghetto, the German propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels
Joseph Goebbels
Paul Joseph Goebbels was a German politician and Reich Minister of Propaganda in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945. As one of Adolf Hitler's closest associates and most devout followers, he was known for his zealous oratory and anti-Semitism...
wrote in his diary "The procedure is pretty barbaric, and not to be described here more definitely. Not much will remain of the Jews."
After liquidating the Lublin Ghetto, German authorities employed a forced labor work force of inmates of Majdanek to demolish and dismantle the area of the former ghetto, including in the nearby village of Wieniawa
Wieniawa, Masovian Voivodeship
Wieniawa is a village in Przysucha County, Masovian Voivodeship, in east-central Poland. It is the seat of the gmina called Gmina Wieniawa. It lies approximately east of Przysucha and south of Warsaw.-References:...
and the Podzamcze district, and in a symbolical event blew up the Maharam's Synagogue
Maharam's Synagogue
Maharam's Synagogue was a synagogue in Lublin, Poland, which was located on a no longer existing Jateczna 3 Street. The synagogue was a part of synagogical complex in Podzamcze.-History:...
(built in the 17th century in honor of Meir Lublin
Meir Lublin
Meir Lublin or Meir ben Gedalia was a Polish rabbi, Talmudist and Posek . He is well known for his commentary on the Talmud, Meir Einai Chachamim. He is also referred to as Maharam .-Biography:Maharam was born in Lublin, Poland...
). In that way they erased several centuries of Jewish culture and society in Lublin – the Jewish population in 1939 was about a third of the town's total population.
A few individuals managed to escape the liquidation of the Lublin Ghetto and made their way to the Warsaw Ghetto
Warsaw Ghetto
The Warsaw Ghetto was the largest of all Jewish Ghettos in Nazi-occupied Europe during World War II. It was established in the Polish capital between October and November 15, 1940, in the territory of General Government of the German-occupied Poland, with over 400,000 Jews from the vicinity...
, bringing the news of the destruction with them. The eyewitness evidence convinced some Warsaw Jews that in fact, the Germans were intent on exterminating the whole of the Jewish population in Poland
Holocaust in Poland
The Holocaust, also known as haShoah , was a genocide officially sanctioned and executed by the Third Reich during World War II. It took the lives of three million Polish Jews, destroying an entire civilization. Only a small percentage survived or managed to escape beyond the reach of the Nazis...
. However, others, including head of the Warsaw
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
's Judenrat
Judenrat
Judenräte were administrative bodies during the Second World War that the Germans required Jews to form in the German occupied territory of Poland, and later in the occupied territories of the Soviet Union It is the overall term for the enforcement bodies established by the Nazi occupiers to...
, Adam Czerniaków
Adam Czerniaków
Adam Czerniaków , born in Warsaw, Poland, was a Polish-Jewish engineer and senator to the prewar Polish Sejm for Nonpartisan Bloc for Cooperation with the Government...
, at the time dismissed these reports of mass murders as "exaggerations". In total, only 230 Lublin Jews survived the German occupation.
See also
- List of Nazi-era ghettos
- Nisko PlanNisko PlanThe Nisko Plan, also Lublin Plan or Nisko-Lublin Plan , was developed in September 1939 by the Nazi German Schutzstaffel as a "territorial solution to the Jewish Question"...
- Operation ReinhardOperation ReinhardOperation Reinhard was the code name given to the Nazi plan to murder Polish Jews in the General Government, and marked the most deadly phase of the Holocaust, the use of extermination camps...
- Henio ZytomirskiHenio ZytomirskiHenio Zytomirski , was a Polish Jew born in Lublin, Poland and was murdered at the age of 9 in a gas chamber in Majdanek concentration camp, during the Nazi occupation of Poland. Henio became an icon of the Holocaust, not only in Lublin but all over Poland...
- Oskar DirlewangerOskar DirlewangerOskar Paul Dirlewanger was a World War II officer of the SS who commanded the SS-Sturmbrigade Dirlewanger, a penal battalion composed of German criminals...
- Richard WendlerRichard WendlerRichard Wendler was a high-ranking Nazi politician who was in charge of Lublin concentration camp and who organized the creation of the Częstochowa Ghetto. He was the mayor of the city Hof between 1933 to 1941. In 1942 he became a Gruppenführer in the SS.-External links:...
Literature
- Tadeusz Radzik, Zagłada lubelskiego getta. The extermination of the Lublin Ghetto, Maria Curie-Skłodowska University 2007 (in Polish and English)
External links
- Scenes from the Lublin Ghetto (Jewish Virtual LibraryJewish Virtual LibraryJewish Virtual Library is an online encyclopedia published by the American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise . Established in 1993, it is a comprehensive website covering Israel, the Jewish people, and Jewish culture.-History:...
) - The Lublin Ghetto and the Holocaust
- Lublin Ghetto Listings - April 1942
- Chronicles of the Vilna Ghetto: Photo Gallery :: Lublin
- My Visit to Lublin, Poland