ARTEMOVSK

ARTEMOVSK (until 1923, Bakhmut ), city in the Ukraine. Jewish settlement in Artemovsk dates from the late 18^th century. The numbers increased as a result of immigration from Lithuania and Volhynia. In 1847, 496 Jews were registered in the community; in 1897, 3,259 (16.8% of the total population). In the early 20^th century Jews owned big factories producing flour, beer, and soap, stone quarries, sawmills, and most of the oil storage facilities. Five hundred Jews worked in the garment industry. There were 11 ḥadarim, a talmud torah, and three public schools, one of them a vocational school for girls. In 1926, 6,631 (17.1%) Jews lived in the city and 17,622 (2.3%) in the Artemovsk district. Pogroms in October 1905 led to deaths and injuries and heavy damage to Jewish property. In the Soviet period Jewish sources of livelihood underwent a change: in 1926, 20% were blue-collar workers and clerks, 10% were artisans, 30% remained petty merchants, and the rest were without a defined profession. A Yiddish school with 400 pupils (in 1926) was in operation. The number of Jews dropped to 5,299 by 1939 (total population 55,409). The Germans occupied Artemovsk on October 31, 1941. On December 21, ten Jews were hanged. On January 5, 1942, 3,000 Jews were assembled and then held without food and water until February 15, when they were sealed off in one of the tunnels of the marble quarry and suffocated to death. In 1959, 1,800 Jews were registered in Artemovsk (30% of the total population); by 1979 the number had fallen to about 1,000. Most left in the 1990s.

bibliography:

Judenpogrome in Russland, 2 (1909), 204–10. add. bibliography: pk Ukrainah, s.v.

[Yehuda Slutsky /

Shmuel Spector (2^nd ed.)]