Ilintsy
ILINTSY
ILINTSY (in Jewish sources, Linets ), town in Vinnitsa district, Ukraine. Jews started to settle there in the mid-17th century. By 1765 they numbered 386 persons. After its incorporation into Russia in 1793 it belonged administratively to the Kiev province. In 1790 the Jews numbered 423. In 1852 all of the town's 76 artisans were Jews. The community numbered 3,407 in 1847, 4,993 (49.7% of the total population) in 1897, and 5,407 (46.8%) in 1926. Before wwi almost all the shops belonged to Jewish merchants, among them were 36 textile stores, 19 groceries, and 11 stores for leather products. At this time there were six synagogues and a private school for boys in operation. Two pogroms, perpetrated by *Denikin's army, occurred in 1919. During the interwar period many Jews left Ilintsy, and by 1939 their number had dropped to 2,217 (total population 3,484). Many changes occurred in Jewish economic life at this time. The shopkeepers disappeared from the scene by the end of the 1920s and the artisans were forced to join cooperatives. Some of these cooperatives developed into garment and shoe factories. At the end of 1931 there were still 500 unemployed Jewish youngsters in the town. There existed a Yiddish school with about 250 pupils, and a Jewish local council operated in the 1920s.
Ilintsy was occupied by the Germans on July 23, 1941. They appointed a Judenrat and imposed a heavy fine in gold and silver on the Jews. At the end of August the Jews were concentrated in an open ghetto. In November 1941 Ukrainian police murdered 43 Jews and on April 24, 1942, 1,000 Jews were executed by the Germans. On May 27–28 another 700 Jews were murdered. In December the Germans burned down houses where Jews were hiding, shooting those who attempted to escape. The remaining Jews were sent to a labor camp on the outskirts of the town. Executions of individuals and groups occurred regularly. A small resistance group of 18 Jews was organized by David Mudrik, armed with two handguns, hand grenades, and knives. They escaped from the camp in August 1943 and organized a Jewish partisan company in the framework of the Second Stalin Brigade of the Vinnitsa district. Of the total force of 124 Jewish fighters, only 52 were armed. The town was liberated in 1944. In 1970 the Jewish population was estimated at approximately 100 (20 families). They had no synagogue. Most left in the 1990s.
bibliography:
pk, s.v.
[Shmuel Spector (2nd ed.)]