The first Jewish settlers arrived in Parczew already there in the 15^th century or by the first half of the 16th century, although the privilege for Jews to settle there was granted by King Zygmunt August only in 1564. An organized Jewish community may well have existed there before 1541. In 1566, the community numbered around 60 Jews.

More specific information about the Jews from Parczew is provided in the documents from 1563, when the town council made and attempt to remove Orthodox Jews from the town centre. A compromise between the town’s authorities and the Jewish community was reached only in 1623 when the community agreed to pay the town’s taxes. According to the inspection of 1565, there were 11 Jewish houses, including a teacher’s house, which indicates that a synagogue probably existed in the town at that time[1.1].

Probably towards the end of the 16th century or in the first half of the 17th century, a synagogue was erected and the cemetery area was determined. In 1633, King Władysław IV renewed the privileges for Jews to use those buildings. The Jewish district in Parczew, including the synagogue, house of prayer and cemetery, was situated outside the town walls, to the north of the town square.

There were 84 Jews paying taxes in Parczew in 1674. In the 16th and 17th centuries, the Jews were granted other royal privileges, among others: the privilege granted by King Jan Kazimierz in 1654 which allowed the Jews to” build, trade, slaughter cattle, or even brew beer and honey for their own needs”[1.2]. Crafts (shoe-making, bakery and pottery) was source of income for many Jewish families[1.3].

As a result of the wars in the second half of the 17th century, the town and the Jewish district were almost completely destroyed. In 1718, only 20 townsmen, including four Jews lived there. The Jewish kehilla consisted only of 29 small centres located near Parczew.

Fortunately, the town was rebuilt in the second half of the 18th century. In 1787, 679 Jewish people lived there which constituted 40% of the overall population. The Jewish kehilla developed quickly at the turn of the 18th century and 19th centuries. Its members were leaders in local trade and crafts, contributing also to development of the local industry.

According to the inventories of 1770, apart from numerous Jewish workshops (shoe-makers, hatmakers, tailors and a coppersmith), 18 shops in the town belonged to Jews[1.4]. From the mid-19^th century to the 1930s, Jews made up half of the town’s population. In the second half of the 19th century, the Hasidic movement became influential in the town[1.5]. Abraham Bornstein situated his court in Parczew. The tzadik was son-in-law of the famous Menachem Mendel Morgenstern from Kock. Bornstein was a local rabbi for 20 years[1.6].

At the beginning of the 1920s, the local Jews made up 51% of the total population, amounting to 8,000 persons. The synagogue of the Association of Orthodox Jews, 27 houses of prayer, including two supervised by the kehilla, a mikvah, a house for the poor and a cemetery operated in the town. Most buildings were situated near the following streets: Bożniczna, Żabia, Brzeska, Koński Rynek, Kościelna, Kolejowa and Warszawska. The Jewish Community subsidized an Association to Help the Sick and religious education in Parczew. In about 1923, a new, wooden synagogue was constructed in Żabia Street.

In the interwar period, several associations of social and educational character operated in the town; among others, a branch of the “Tarbut” Association, established in the 1920s and influenced by Zionist organizations[1.7]. On the political scene the most popular were the Agudath, supported by Hassidim and Orthodox, and the Bund, representing members of trade unions. Also the Hashomer Hatzair and He-Halutz were active in the town and had their “kibbutz” from 1929, which was preparing Jewish inhabitants to leave to Palestine[1.1.6].

In June 1936, an “invasion” on Parczew took place, during which Jewish shops and houses were demolished and looted possessions were burnt in the market square by Polish nationalists.

Just before World War II, about 5,000 Jews resided in the town, which made up almost half of the overall population.

Germans took over Parczew on 5 October 1939 and began the occupation with confiscations and requisitions. Still at the end of the year a Judenrat was established and the Jews were subjected to forced labour[1.1.6]. In November 1939 the first mass execution was carried out, and on 18 and 20 February 1940, on the local Jewish cemetery Wermacht and SS units executed approximately 350 Jewish prisoners of war who were walking in the so-called “Death March” from Lublin do Biała Podlaska. Their bodies were buried in a mass grave on the cemetery by a group of Jews designated by the Judenrat who later were also shot dead.

In March 1941, a ghetto was opened in the Jewish district of Parczew, that is between the Streets Szeroka and Bożnicza. According to different sources, between 6,000 and 7,000 Jews were placed there, coming from Parczew, Wohyń, Kock, Czemierniki and other towns in Radzyń county, such as Kraków and Lublin.

On 19 August 1942, SS men and military police executed about 400 Jews in Parczew. Their bodies were buried in the local cemetery. On 8 October, they shot another 300 Jews from Parczew, Wohyń and Komarówka Podlaska.

In 1942, a group of prisoners from the Parczew ghetto was resettled to the nearby village of Romaszka, where the Nazis opened a labour camp for the Jews. Both men and women worked there about ten hours a day carrying out irrigation work. The camp was attacked by the partisans and the prisoners escaped after being liberated.

Liquidation of the ghetto took place in October 1942. The Nazis deported a number of Jews to the extermination camp in Treblinka, around 100 prisoners were shot on the spot and some were resettled to the ghetto in Międzyrzecz Podlaski. From there they were transported by rail to the extermination camp in Treblinka. The last transport of Jews from Międzyrzecz occured in July 1943. The last Jews from Parczew (the ones who stayed in the so-called secondary ghetto), were murdered by the Nazis in 1943.

Many Jews managed to escape and hide in nearby Parczew Forests, where a Jewish partisan unit led by Aleksander Skotnicki was formed.

After liberation about 200 Jews returned to Parczew. They were mostly repatriates from USSR who originated from Parczew or its neighbourhood. On 5 February 1946, a pogrom took place, carried out by a partisan unit of the Freedom and Independence organization from Włodawa district. After an abortive attack on a military station, the partisans looted Jewish shops, demolished houses and shot three Jewish inhabitants. Those events made the majority of Jews leave the town[1.8].

Bibliography

• M. Kubiszyn, Parczew, [in:] Śladami Żydów. Lubelszczyzna, Lublin (2011), pp. 305–309.
• Parczew, [in:] Encyclopaedia of Jewish Communities Poland, vol. 7: Lublin, Kielce districts, A. Wein (ed.), Jerusalem (1999), p. 408.
• Parczew, [in:] The Encyclopedia of Jewish Life Before and During the Holocaust, vol. II, S. Spector, G. Wigoder (eds.), New York (2001), p. 969.
• Parczew – sefer zikaron le-kedoshei Parczew ve-ha-seviva, Sh. Zonnenshein (ed.), Haifa (1977).
• A. Trzciński, Śladami zabytków kultury żydowskiej na Lubelszczyźnie, Lublin (1990).
• M. Zakrzewska-Dubasowa, Parczew XV–XVII w., Lublin (1962).