GORODOK (Pol. Gródek Jagielloński, Yid. Greiding)

GORODOK (Pol. Gródek Jagielloński , Yid. Greiding ), city in Lvov district, Ukraine, within Poland until 1772 and between the two world wars. The earliest information on the presence of Jews there dates from 1444. Jews were responsible for collection of customs and taxes in Gorodok for short periods. In 1550 King Sigismund ii Augustus granted the town the privilege to exclude Jews (de non tolerandis Judaeis), but probably those already there remained. In 1662, after Gorodok had been devastated during the Crimean Tartars' invasions, the local governor (starosta) encouraged Jews to settle in the town and rehabilitate it; because of the objections of the townsmen, he assigned them a special quarter, "the Gnin." King John iii Sobieski confirmed their right of residence in 1684. According to the census of 1765, there were 788 Jews living in the "Jewish town of Gnin" and 251 in neighboring villages. As a result of the difficult economic situation, the debts of the community increased, amounting to 3,212 zlotys in 1784. Gorodok had a beautiful synagogue and a famous collection of books as well a bet midrash and yeshivah. Belz ḥasidim dominated, opposing Haskalah and Zionism.

The community numbered 2,952 in 1880 (29% of the total population), and 3,610 in 1900, with an additional 3,478 living in villages in the district. In World War i the Jews of Gorodok and its surroundings suffered severely during the fighting between the Russian and Austrian armies in 1915, and subsequently in 1918–19 during the struggle between the Poles and Ukrainians. There were 2,545 Jews living in the city itself (24% of the population) and 1,414 in the villages in 1921, and 3,281 in 1931. Between the two world wars most of them were occupied in crafts, hawking, and trade in agricultural products.

[Arthur Cygielman]

Holocaust Period

With the German invasion of Poland on Sept. 1, 1939, many Jewish refugees from western Poland arrived in the city, and by 1941 the Jewish population numbered over 5,000. From October 1939 until the outbreak of the German-Soviet war in June 1941 the city was occupied by the Soviets. On June 29, 1941 the Germans captured Gorodok, and neighboring farmers, mainly Ukrainians, attacked the Jews there, and looted their property. Conscription into forced labor camps in Jaktorow and Winniki continued through the autumn of 1941 and 1942. On May 7, 1942, several hundred Jews were deported to Janowska camp in Lvov. On August 13, half the Jews were deported to the extermination camp in Belzec. On December 26, 1942, 1,300 Jews were murdered outside the town and on January 27, 1943, the ghetto was finally liquidated, in an Aktion that lasted three days. A labor camp was established in March 1943, but it was liquidated in May 1943. The last Jews of Gorodok were shot and buried in mass graves near Artyszczow.

[Aharon Weiss /

Shmuel Spector (2^nd ed.)]

bibliography:

B. Wasiutyński, Ludnoüeć żydowska w Polsce … (1930), 107, 115, 147, 151, 196, 212; I. Schiper, Studya nad stosunkami gospodarczymi żydów w Polsce podczas sredniowiecza (1911), 154, 239, 243.