Rowne

A Jewish community had been established in Równe by the mid-16th Century. The community was devastated during the uprising of Bogdan Chmelnitsky in the 17th Century, but the recovery was rapid. In the 19th Century, local Jewish merchants expanded into the lumber and agricultural produce trade, becoming importers of cloth, shoes, porcelain, and glass. With the start of the construction of barracks for the Russian Army in the 1870s, many Jews began to work in construction. In 1897, Równe was home to 13,780 Jews, who made up 56 percent of the total population. In the early 20th Century, the pace of industrial development accelerated, and local Jews ran the largest beer brewery in Volhynia, soap and match factories, flour mills, and brickyards. In 1919, during the Russian Revolution, the Jews were attacked by Simon Petlyura's soldiers, who staged a pogrom that left dozens of Jews dead and maimed. The recovery of the city was slow, but the Jews eventually reestablished their economic preeminence, dominating the local industry, trade, and crafts. Some of them were merchants and artisans, while others owned large enterprises, including soap factories. In the aftermath of World War I, Równe was incorporated into the newly independent Polish Republic. In 1921, it had 21,702 Jewish residents, who comprised 72 percent of the city's population. Most of the artisans, traders, and members of the liberal professions in Równe were Jews. The city had a large number of traditional Jewish welfare and charitable institutions, including a hospital, an orphanage, a nursing home, and a branch of TOZ. An extensive Jewish educational system was developed under the aegis of Tarbut, the Zionist Hebrew-language network of educational institutions, which operated a high school (gymnasium), three elementary schools, and three kindergartens. There were also two yeshivot, a Talmud Torah, private Jewish high schools, and an ORT vocational school. The Bund, the Communists (which had to operate clandestinely), Agudath Israel, and especially the Zionist parties and their youth movements (e.g., Hashomer Hatzair, Gordonia, Beitar) were active in Równe, as were Zionist pioneer-training communes, such as HeHalutz. In 1937, Równe's 25,000 Jews made up about 43 percent of the total population. Following the outbreak of World War II on September 1, 1939, the number of Jews in Równe increased to an estimated 28,000, as many Jews from the German-occupied western Poland found refuge in the city. The Soviet Union invaded Poland on September 17, 1939, in the wake of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Równe was occupied by the Red Army, and it became part of Soviet Ukraine. Under Soviet rule, factories and businesses were nationalized; goods were shipped to the east, and private commerce was banned. Artisans were required to reorganize into state-funded cooperatives, and physicians had to close down their private practices. All Jewish institutions and organizations were disbanded. The Tarbut Hebrew-language high school was replaced with a high school and three primary schools that taught the Soviet curriculum in Yiddish. Some Jewish manufacturers, wholesalers, public figures, and Jewish political activists, who were categorized as "bourgeois" by the Soviet authorities, were deported from Równe to Siberia. Some of the Polish refugees who declined the offer of Soviet citizenship were also sent to the Gulag. Many activists of the Zionist youth movements left Równe for the Land of Israel via Vilna and Romania. Following the German invasion of the USSR on June 22, 1941, approximately 3,000 local Jews (about 10 percent of the Jewish population of the region) were able to flee before the arrival of German troops. The Wehrmacht entered Równe on June 28, 1941. By the end of July that year, hundreds of Jewish men, including intellectuals and public figures, had been murdered. By the end of August, the number of victims had risen to several thousand. Some of the victims of these murder operations were killed at the Gestapo jail on Belaia Street, or in Belaia Street itself. During the summer and fall of 1941, the German authorities introduced a series of anti-Jewish regulations in Równe. Eight days after the arrival of the Germans, all Jews aged 11 and older were required to wear a white armband with a yellow Star of David on their left arm. A month later, the armbands were changed to round yellow patches for all Jews aged 14 and older. By the end of August, the Jews were prohibited from using the sidewalks, and had to walk in the middle of the road. The Jewish population was forced to perform physically demanding work. They were not allowed to leave the city. A great deal of Jewish property was confiscated, and the Jews were required to pay so-called "contributions" to the German occupation authorities. A Jewish Council (Judenrat) of 12 members and a "Jewish Order Service" of 20 members were established in the city. The head of the Judenrat was Dr. Moshe Bergmann, the former headmaster of a local gymnasium. On September 1, the German military administration was replaced by a German civil administration, and Równe became the administrative center of the Gebiet Rowno. Regirungsrat Werner Beer was appointed Gebietskommissar. The city also served as the capital of the Reichskommissariat Ukraine and the residence of the Reichskommissar, Gauleiter Erich Koch. Between November 7-9, 1941, 17,500 Jews who did not have work permits, including women and children, were shot dead in the Sosenki Forest outside the city by various German units, who were assisted by the Ukrainian auxiliary police. After the mass shooting at Sosenki, the Germans tightened security in the streets of Równe, and any Jew caught outside without a work permit would be taken to Belaia Street and shot. The apartments and property of the murdered Jews were confiscated. All of the city's remaining Jews with valid work permits and the members of their immediate families (up to three relatives per worker) were relocated to a "Jewish residential area" (an open ghetto), which was set up in December 1941 in the northwestern section of Równe, not far from the Gestapo jail on Belaia Street. This ghetto came to house about 5,200 Jews, including 1,182 children under the age of 14. Although the ghetto was not fenced off, its inmates were forbidden to leave it without a permit, for any purpose other than forced labor. Most of the Jewish property was looted, and some of it was given away to the Ukrainians. On July 13, 1942, the majority of the ghetto inmates were murdered in Janowa Dolina, near the town of Kostopol. A few dozen Jews survived the liquidation of the Równe Ghetto by working as laborers for Hermann Graebe, chief engineer of the German Josef Jung construction company from Solingen, who would later be recognized as a Righteous among the Nations by Yad Vashem. After the liquidation of the ghetto, the Germans and the Ukrainian auxiliary police combed the ghetto area for hidden Jews. Those found and caught were shot in the area of Belaia Street in Równe. Thus, by the end of July 1942, Reichskommissar Erich Koch declared the city Judenrein, or "cleaned of Jews." Równe was liberated by the Red Army on February 5, 1944.