Borszczów / Borshchiv Jewish Forced Labor Camp
(ITS Case Files)

Background

Borszczów was/is a middle sized town located 61 miles SE of Tarnopol. Before WWII it had a total population of about 5,000, including several thousand Jews.  For a history of Jewish residence in Borczszów, consult Pinkas HaKehillot Polen.

During the war, Borszczów was initially occupied by the Hungarians and then by the Germans.  In April 1942 a ghetto was established and deportations began shortly thereafter, mostly to the Belzec death camp. The ghetto was liquidated in 1943.  Borszczów was also the site of a Jewish forced labor camp and some Jews were transferred or escaped from there to other places in the region.

This database consists of information on 155 persons taken from the files of the International Tracing Service (ITS).  The names are limited to those persons who at some time were held in the Borszczów labor camp, and who between 1953 and 1959 sought ITS confirmation of their imprisonment, presumably in order to obtain some sort of certification/compensation.  The requests for information came principally from Israel, the United States and Canada.  (There probably is considerable additional ITS information on the fate of a much larger number of Borszczow Jews who were not in the forced labor camp. Such a compilation will have to wait for the total release of the ITS collection or the willingness of someone to tackle this project where ITS access is permitted, e.g. the USHMM or Yad Vashem.)  Many, but not all, of the listed persons were born in Borszczów.

The information in this database was drawn from the index cards accompanying each case file.  They consist of family, maiden and given names, parents' names, date and place of birth and case number.  The files themselves contain considerable additional information, especially the name and location of the person making the request for information, often the individual him/herself.

Given the fact that ITS holdings are not available on the web and access to the sites where access is possible can be slow and difficult, I am prepared to scan/provide the complete files of any person identified in this database in response to individual requests at pdlande@starpower.net.  Please limit such requests to these persons.

Database

This database includes 155 individuals who worked at the Borszczów/Borshchiv Jewish Forced Labor Camp.  (There are 170 records for 155 persons — when contradictory name information appeared, both were included).

The fields for this database are as follows:

• Surname
• Given Name
• Maiden Name
• Date of Birth
• Place of Birth
• Father's Given Name
• Mother's Maiden Name
• Mother's Given Name
• Comments
• Case File Number

Acknowledgments

The information contained in this database was indexed from the files of the International Tracing Service (ITS).  Peter Landé compiled the list.

In addition, thanks to JewishGen Inc. for providing the website and database expertise to make this database accessible.  Special thanks to Warren Blatt and Michael Tobias for their continued contributions to Jewish genealogy.  Particular thanks to Nolan Altman, Vice President of Data Acquisition and Coordinator of JewishGen's Holocaust Database files.

Nolan Altman
April, 2016

Searching the Database

This database is searchable via JewishGen's Holocaust Database.