Volchansk

Jews began to settle in Volchansk in the second half of the 19th Century, when the Russian authorities had relaxed their restrictions on Jews living outside the Pale of Settlement. Until the early 20th Century, the local community was very small. In 1897, Volchansk had only 40 Jews, who made up 0.35 percent of the total population. Around the turn of the century, the number of Jews in Volchansk grew significantly, reaching 182 people in 1910. Most of the local Jews at the time were either merchants - trading in fruit, wool, bread, and leather - or craftsmen. In 1916, Volchansk had a Jewish school, with Russian as the language of instruction. Despite being relatively few in number, the Jews of Volchansk were politically active. In the early 20th Century, the town had cells of various Zionist organizations and of the non-Zionist Socialist Bund party. The Jews of Volchansk suffered during the tumultuous years of the Russian Revolution and Civil War. In 1919, the White troops of Anton Denikin carried out a pogrom against the local Jews. In the Soviet period, the socioeconomic life of the Jews of Volchansk was utterly transformed. The ban imposed by the Soviet authorities on all forms of private economic activity left many local Jews with no means of subsistence. Many of them were forced to seek other employment, or abandon the town altogether. Some of the Jews of Volchansk, the young ones in particular, left it for cities, especially nearby Kharkov, in search of new educational and vocational opportunities. In 1939, Volchansk was home to 210 Jews, who made up one percent of its total population. Jewish refugees from the western regions of the Soviet Union arrived in the town following the Nazi invasion in June 1941. Most of the Jews appear to have been able to leave Volchansk before its occupation by German troops on November 6, 1941. Five days later, the city was liberated by the Red Army, and then re-occupied by the Germans in the summer of 1942. During the periods of German occupation, some 100 of the Jews of Volchansk were either shot or gassed to death. The Red Army finally liberated Volchansk on February 10, 1943.