Częstochowa Ghetto uprising

The Częstochowa Ghetto uprising was an insurrection in Poland's Częstochowa Ghetto against German occupational forces during World War II. It took place in late June 1943, resulting in some 2,000 Jews being killed.

The ghetto was established following a day known as Bloody Monday, a day in which the Nazis killed 300 Jewish citizens in its occupation of the city of Częstochowa. The ghetto lasted from its inception on September 3, 1939, to its liberation by the Soviet Red Army in January 1945. The prisoners of the ghetto were forced to work in slave labor factories. Throughout the life of this site, it housed 48,000 Polish Jewsof which, 40,000 were deported to Treblinka extermination camp.The statistical data compiled on the basis o
"Glossary of 2,077 Jewish towns in Poland"
by '' Virtual Shtetl'' Museum of the History of the Polish Jews  , as well a
"Getta Żydowskie," by ''Gedeon''
  and "Ghetto List" by Michael Peters at www.deathcamps.org/occupation/ghettolist.htm  . Accessed July 12, 2011.

The first instance of armed resistance took place on January 4, 1943, at the so-called ''Large Ghetto'' established by the Germans in April 1941. The Jews of Czestochowa.
''CoexistenceHolocaustMemory'', 2004. Retrieved April 26, 2012. During the 'selection' of some 500 Jews to be deported to the ghetto in Radomsko, shooting broke out at the Warsaw Square (now, Ghetto Heroes Square) in which Mendel Fiszelewicz (Fiszelowicz) along with Isza Fajner were killed. 50 young Jews were executed in reprisal.

Full-scale insurgency

The final liquidation of the so-called ''Small Ghetto'' (work camp for munitions factory) commenced in June 1943,Andrew Rajcher (translated from Polish original)
The Częstochowa Ghetto.
''World Society of Częstochowa Jews and Their Descendants'' (Home Page). Retrieved April 26, 2012. after four months of mass executions at the Cemetery (Jewish elders, children, intellectuals) and 'selections' of Jews for deportations to slave labour camps including in Bliżyn. On June 25 (or 26), 1943 a full uprising broke out, organized by the ''Organisation of Jewish Fighters'', even though the insurgents were weakly armed. They barricaded themselves in bunkers along the Nadrzeczna Street. In the fighting and subsequent massacres 1,500 Jews died. The leader of the uprising, Mordechaj Zylberberg, committed suicide as the Germans were about to capture his bunker on Nadrzeczna. The uprising was suppressed on June 30, 1943 with additional 500 Jews burned alive or buried beneath the rubble of the ''Small Ghetto''. The remaining 3,900 fugitives were rounded up and sent to camp in Warta or incarcerated at the nearby work prisons, Hasag Pelcery and Huta Częstochowa. However, the Częstochowa Ghetto was not liquidated. Some 10,000 Jews were brought in from Skarżysko-Kamienna in 1944. Around 5,200 of them were liberated by the Red Army in mid January 1945.

References

* "Ruch podziemny w częstochowskim getcie : wspomnienia" Liber Brener

{{DEFAULTSORT:Czestochowa Ghetto Uprising
The Holocaust in Poland
Ghetto uprisings
Częstochowa Ghetto
1943 in Poland
June 1943 in Europe