Archival film of the ghettos in Dąbrowa Górnicza and Będzin part 1 of 2

Film shot in the ghettos of Dąbrowa Górnicza and Będzin, probably at the beginning of the ghettos.

Dabrowa Górnicza is part of the Katowice conurbation. Jews settled in Dabrowa Gornicza in the middle of the 19th century. There were 4,304 Jews living in Dabrowa Gornicza according to the 1921 census (11% of the total population).
The German army captured Dabrowa Gornicza on 3 September 1939. In the fall of 1940 several hundred young Jewish men were deported to slave labor camps in Germany. Several hundred more were deported in the course of 1941. At the end of that year a ghetto was established. On 5 May 1942, the first deportation took place in which 630 Jews were taken to Auschwitz and exterminated. In the second deportation, conducted on 12 August 1942, another few hundred Jews were sent to their death in Auschwitz. On 26 June 1943, the ghetto in Dabrowa Gornicza was liquidated and all its inmates were transferred to the ghetto in Srodula (a suburb of Sosnowiec), the only ghetto still existing in Upper Silesia. It too was liquidated and all its inhabitants, including the Jews from Dabrowa Gornicza, deported to Auschwitz and killed.

According to the 1921 census, there were 17,298 Jews in Bedzin or 62.1 percent of its total population.[By 1938, the number of Jews had increased to about 22,500.

Situated close to the border, Bedzin was quickly captured by the Wehrmacht. On 7 September, persecution of the Jews began, with the instituting of economic sanctions. On 8 September, the Będzin synagogue was burned, and the first massacre of local Jews took place.

The ghetto was founded in May 1942 but deportations had started as early as October 1940. Despite cooperation with the occupiers as is shown in this film, several large deportations took place in 1942. The last major deportations took place in 1943: 5,000 were deported on 22 June 1943 and 8,000 around 13 August 1943. About 1,000 remaining Jews were deported in the subsequent months. A rising took place in August 1943 which was put down and the ghetto was eliminated.

This film is held in the Polish film archive in ul. Chelmska, Warsaw.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Dabrowa
• Gornicza
• Dąbrowa
• Górnicza
• Poland
• Polska
• Bedzin
• Będzin
• Polin
• Polen
• Jews
• Jewish
• Nazi
• Germany
• shoah
• holocaust

[HannahBerliner]

No, I don't have any photos or documents. I wish I did.

[alanheath]

@HannahBerliner It would be difficult to trace someone although prewar records exist. Some telephone books have been published on line although only business owners and richer people had telephones then.

[HannahBerliner]

Can you identify the people from the Będzin Judenrat? My family was from Dąbrowa and Będzin.

[alanheath]

@HannahBerliner I am sorry I can't.

Do you have material from the family (photographs or other documents)?

[HannahBerliner]

Thank you so much for providing these videos. I'm sure you're correct, Alan: the Nazis wanted to show happy Jews with monstrous features.  Can you ID anybody in the films? Is there any more information you have about them?

[alanheath]

@HannahBerliner In part of the film there are people from the Judenrat in Będzin who would be identifiable - other than that it would be very difficult. There are very few survivors from either ghetto, especially Dąbrowa Gornicza.

[KogekiMt2]

Boże...zbiera mi się na płacz ;(

God...i want to cry... ;(

[atownthuglife]

@pitotipp man shut yo ass up cause you aint so pretty eitha fool

[pitotipp]

ugly people !

[Droxy1940]

Even 70 years later it makes your blood run cold! It is a crime unparalleled in our entire miserable world history and must shame Germany for ever.

[jt123egypte]

Many thanks for keeping the memory alive of those who were killed!