Goniądz | Podlaskie Voivodeship

Destruction of Jews in Goniądz

1 Sitio(s) de ejecución

Tipo de lugar antes:

Jewish cemetery

Memoriales:

No

Período de ocupación:

1941-1944

Número de víctimas:

At least 59

Entrevista del testigo

Antoni R., born in 1928: "During the German occupation, there was a gendarmerie in Goniądz made up of four to six Germans, plus Ukrainians and Poles, and a commissioner who supervised the village head (sołtys). In the autumn of 1942, the Jews were taken away to Bogusze in carts provided by local residents who had been requisitioned. The commissioner had ordered the carts to be ready by 5:00 AM. The Jews were arrested early in the morning and were only allowed to take bare essentials. At the time of the Jews' deportation to Bogusze, Goniądz was guarded on all sides. The German lines were so dense that no one dared leave their house. More than 50 carts transported them to Bogusze. As far as I remember, not a single Jew returned to the town after the war." (Witness N°YIU1153P, interviewed in Goniądz, on September 22, 2020)

Archivos polacos

Questionnaire on mass executions and mass graves.

1. Date and place of the execution: June 1941

2. Type of execution / shooting, hanging, or other types: shooting

3. Data concerning the executed victims: Poles, Jews, foreigners: Jews. Number of people executed: 116

4. Where the victims came from: residents of the town Name, age, profession, and address: unknown

5. Is it known what the victims were accused of, or was the execution an order of retaliation or other: motives unknown;

6. Who carried out the execution? The gendarmerie, the Gestapo, the SS, the police, the Wehrmacht? The gendarmerie, the Gestapo, the police.

7. Are the names of the perpetrators of the crimes known? Give the names: unknown.

8. Were the bodies burned? Or destroyed in another way? In what location? No.

9. Where were the corpses buried? Exact location: a portion of the victims is buried in the Jewish cemetery of Goniadz, another portion in mass graves located 300m from the cemetery.

10. Description of the grave / graves / dimensions, probable number of victims per grave: impossible to provide exact information because the site has currently become a pasture;

11. Was an exhumation of the bodies carried out? Was an official record made at the site of the grave? The corpses from the mass graves were exhumed some time after the execution and buried in a Jewish cemetery.

12. Are there reasons to request an upcoming exhumation? No.

[RG-15.019M Reel #1 (p. 427 on the PDF) Village of Goniadz, former powiat [county] of Bialystok (currently: powiat of Monki), voivodeship of Bialystok. Deposition of Dolinski Jan, 57 years old, living in the village of Goniadz, profession unknown, dated 20.09.1945. He bases his testimony on his own observations as well as those of the inhabitants of the municipality.]

Nota histórica

Goniądz is a town in Mońki County, Podlaskie Voivodeship, located in northeastern Poland along the Biebrza River, approximately 52 km (32 mi) northwest of Białystok, the regional capital.

Jewish presence in Goniądz began in the early 18th century, with only a small number of families living in the town in 1716 and utilizing a private prayer house. The community's legal status transformed in 1795 when Prussian authorities abolished the de non tolerandis Iudaeis privilege, lifting the restrictions on Jewish residency. This policy change sparked rapid immigration. By 1799, the Jewish population had risen to 498 people, making up 36% of the town's 1373 inhabitants. The following eight decades marked a period of remarkable growth, during which the Jewish population quadrupled while the overall town population merely doubled. The community reached 1337 individuals by 1847. By January 1, 1878, that number grew to 1880 residents, representing 64% of the 2943 total citizens in Goniądz. This growth persisted through the late 19th century, and the 1897 census documented 2056 Jewish inhabitants, who constituted 59% of the local population. During the interwar period, although the absolute numbers declined, Jews still made up 43% of Goniądz's population, numbering 1,135 individuals.

Daily life for the community was primarily centered around the Old and New Market Squares. As Zionist influence grew in the town, primary schools teaching in Hebrew and Yiddish were established. The community's social and religious infrastructure was fully developed. The local synagogue served as the heart of spiritual life, while a public bathhouse (mikveh) operated near the riverbank along today's Nadbiebrzańska Street. The Jewish cemetery was located just 200 meters from the Catholic cemetery along the road leading toward the village of Downary (currently 15 Mickiewicza Street). Antoni R., born in 1928, interviewed by Yahad - In Unum, recalls that before the war, the Jewish residents in Goniądz lived around the market square, where they owned shops and worked as merchants, shoemakers, tailors, and blacksmiths. Relations between Poles and Jews were very good at the time, completely free of tension. He specifically remembers two Jewish residents from the town, Dawidek and Tykocki.

Holocausto por balas en cifras

The German occupation of Goniądz began with a ten-day incursion in September 1939, during which soldiers burned the local synagogue before ceding control to Soviet forces. The Wehrmacht reentered the town on June 26, 1941, ending the period of Soviet occupation. Shortly afterward, a new administration was established, which included a night watch and an auxiliary police unit organized by Bernard Kempa.

The beginning of the German occupation was marked by the persecution and killing of anyone considered loyal to the Soviet regime. On July 4, 1941, an SS unit humiliated elderly Jewish residents, while a group of 40 former Communist activists was arrested and confined to a store cellar, where local policemen beat them. According to testimonies from two survivors, between 20 and 180 individuals, including both Jews and Poles, were beaten to death on July 7. Additional archival sources, however, state that 59 Jewish and 3 Polish suspected Communists were killed and buried at the Jewish cemetery on July 6 and 13. During the pogrom on July 20 and 21, 20 Jewish residents were killed by Polish policemen.

According to available sources and Yahad witnesses, multiple shootings took place during the German occupation at the Jewish cemetery of Goniądz. This site contains several burial locations of Holocaust victims, with population estimates ranging from several dozen to over a hundred people. These locations hold individuals shot and buried directly at the cemetery as well as those reinterred there at a later date.

By mid-July 1941, anti-Jewish policies implemented in the town included the creation of a Jewish Council (Judenrat), the compulsory wearing of yellow identifying marks, restrictions on movement, forced labor, and monetary contributions. In August 1941, a ghetto set up in the old market square was sealed, from which approximately 500 Jews were routinely marched to the Osowiec Fortress to service various military enterprises. Following a brief period of military rule, a German civil administration took control of the town in late August 1941, and 14 additional Jewish men were killed in September of that year.

The liquidation of the Goniądz community occurred on November 2, 1942, when a joint force of SS personnel, German Gendarmes, and Polish police surrounded the ghetto, trapping between 900 and 1280 people. The captives were transported on carts to the Bogusze transit camp near East Prussia, which served as a regional collection point for mass deportations. From there, between 2500 and 5000 prisoners were deported to the Treblinka killing center on December 15, 1942, followed by the final 2000 inmates who were deported to Auschwitz on January 3, 1943.

Following the deportations, empty Jewish properties were plundered. Leftover furniture and belongings were collected in the old school building, where local residents were permitted to take items freely. German forces destroyed or burned the remaining property, and surviving Jewish houses were later occupied by local farmers after the war.

In total, only approximately 20 Jews from Goniądz managed to survive the war. Half survived the concentration camp system, while the other ten survived by hiding in neighboring rural villages with the assistance of sympathetic locals despite the risks. In May 1944, German Gendarmes discovered and killed three Jews in hiding alongside their Polish protectors, Bolesław and Helena Kulikowski.

Today, the Jewish cemetery in Goniądz remains devastated, with only around 20 matzevot remaining. In May 1945, the remains of Polish victims were exhumed and reinterred in the local Catholic cemetery. While a commemorative plaque dedicated to the history of the Jewish cemetery mentions the 59 Jews and 3 Poles killed at the beginning of the occupation, no official memorial stands to commemorate the Holocaust victims buried at the site.

Jewishgen

Pueblos cercanos

• Radziłów
• Zubole-Trzcianne

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