Davyd-Haradok or David-Gorodok is a town in Brest Region,

Belarus Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus spans an a ...

. As of 2025, it has a population of 5,658.

History

Within the

Grand Duchy of Lithuania The Grand Duchy of Lithuania was a sovereign state in northeastern Europe that existed from the 13th century, succeeding the Kingdom of Lithuania, to the late 18th century, when the territory was suppressed during the 1795 Partitions of Poland, ...

, Davyd-Haradok was part of

Brest Litovsk Voivodeship Brest Litovsk Voivodeship (; ) was a unit of administrative territorial division and a seat of local government (voivode) in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth) from 1566 until the May Constitution in 1791, and from ...

. In 1793, Davyd-Haradok was acquired by the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

in the course of the

Second Partition of Poland The 1793 Second Partition of Poland was the second of partitions of Poland, three partitions (or partial annexations) that ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth by 1795. The second partition (politics), partition occurred i ...

. The 18 March 1921

Peace of Riga The Treaty of Riga was signed in Riga, Latvia, on between Poland on one side and Soviet Russia (acting also on behalf of Soviet Belarus) and Soviet Ukraine on the other, ending the Polish–Soviet War (1919–1921). The chief negotiators o ...

between

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

on one side and

Soviet Russia The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (Russian SFSR or RSFSR), previously known as the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and the Russian Soviet Republic, and unofficially as Soviet Russia,Declaration of Rights of the labo ...

and

Soviet Ukraine The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, abbreviated as the Ukrainian SSR, UkrSSR, and also known as Soviet Ukraine or just Ukraine, was one of the constituent republics of the Soviet Union from 1922 until 1991. Under the Soviet one-party m ...

on the other defined Davyd-Haradok (Dawidgródek) as part of Poland in the interwar period. It was administratively located in the

Polesie Voivodeship Polesie Voivodeship () was an administrative unit of interwar Poland (1918–1939), named after the historical region of Polesia. It was created by the Council of Ministers of the Second Polish Republic on February 19, 1921, as a result of peac ...

. Following the

invasion of Poland The invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign, Polish Campaign, and Polish Defensive War of 1939 (1 September – 6 October 1939), was a joint attack on the Second Polish Republic, Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany, the Slovak R ...

in September 1939 at the start of

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, the village was occupied by the Soviet Union until 1941. In 1940, more than a third of the total population was Jewish, 4,350 Jews. The town was under

German occupation German-occupied Europe, or Nazi-occupied Europe, refers to the sovereign countries of Europe which were wholly or partly militarily occupied and civil-occupied, including puppet states, by the (armed forces) and the government of Nazi Germany at ...

from 7 July 1941 until 9 July 1944. On 10 August 1941, 3,000 Jews older than 14 years old were murdered in a mass execution perpetrated by an

Einsatzgruppen (, ; also 'task forces') were (SS) paramilitary death squads of Nazi Germany that were responsible for mass murder, primarily by shooting, during World War II (1939–1945) in German-occupied Europe. The had an integral role in the imp ...

unit consisting of Germans and their collaborators. Survivors were imprisoned in a

ghetto A ghetto is a part of a city in which members of a minority group are concentrated, especially as a result of political, social, legal, religious, environmental or economic pressure. Ghettos are often known for being more impoverished than other ...

where they were forced to perform

forced labour Forced labour, or unfree labour, is any work relation, especially in modern or early modern history, in which people are employed against their will with the threat of destitution, detention, or violence, including death or other forms of ...

and suffered harsh living conditions, many deaths. On 10 September 1942, 1,263 remaining inhabitants of the ghetto, the vast majority women and children, were murdered. About a hundred of them managed to escape to the forest.

Notes

References

External links

Photos on Radzima.org

Memorial for the Jewish population murdered during World War 2
* {{Authority control Populated places in Belarus Populated places in Brest region Stolin district Holocaust locations in Belarus Historic Jewish communities in Belarus