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The Tragic 9^th of Ab

On the ninth day of the month of Ab, three people crawled under the wires, among them Moshe Gutholz (a son of the red-haired Asher of Bodzechow). Several meters outside the camp they were detected and brought back to the camp. The Werkschutz-leader Rade ordered them shot at once. Moshe Gutholz asked for pity of the Werkschutz-leader, and that his life be spared. When the cruel man pushed him away, Gutholz caught him at his throat and cried: “murderer, why do you want to kill me!” With much skill he caught Rade's gun and wanted to shoot him. The Werkschutz leader shouted and the Ukrainians who

Party in Honour of the 20th Anniversary of Israel's Independence Organized in Tel Aviv by the Organization of Ostrovtser Jews in Israel, Attended by Ostrowiec Jews from abroad visiting Israel.

were standing around, started shooting into the crowd and into the barracks, as they could not shoot Gutholz who fought with his murderer and rolled with him on the floor. Then they started beating Gutholz with the gun barrels on his head till he lost consciousness, and only then could they remove the revolver from his hand, and shoot him. During the shooting into the crowd and into the barracks, six more people were killed, amongst whom was a boy of 17, Aizik Seifman – and several were badly wounded. All the victims were buried on Cementow Square near the camp. During the riots, the other two escapees who were brought back, managed to flee again. Thus we lived through a many faced ninth of Ab.

A few days after the riot, on the 10^th of August, 1944, the camp was liquidated. We were loaded, 65 persons in every railway car, along with provisions consisting of lots of bread, eggs and sugar, and we went, not knowing where, escorted by the S.S. men from Ostrowiec. 24 hours later we knew where we were going: -- to Auschwitz! Of course, we already knew the meaning of that camp, and despair took hold of all of us.

As luck would have it, no 'selection' was undertaken on our group, as they did to the Lodz ghetto transports. We were led directly to the bath and after being washed, we were clothed in all kinds of wear with red stripes. We were then transported to the gypsy camp and allocated two blocks – 600 men in each block. There we were sorted out like wormy peas: specialists and non-specialists, every profession separately. Then they started to se4nd us away with other transports, never telling what the destination was. During the High Holidays, our New Year and the Atonement Day, two selections were arranged, while on Hoshana Raba (seventh day of the Feast of Tabernacles) the third selection took place – the selections took a heavy toll of Ostrowiec Jews lives. Those who stayed alive, attempted very hard to get registered for transportation away from the place where they had to watch the fire escaping from the crematoria ovens. Thus the last of the Ostrowiec Jews were separated one from the other. The liquidation of the Ostrowiec camp put an end to the local Jewish problem. Ostrowiec became 'Judenrein', and the dream of the Hitlerites and the anti-Semitic Polaks came true.

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While we were in the camp, all the Jewish houses in the town have undergone dismantling, accompanied with search for valuables and goods. The Poles were not too shy to use the brick of the destroyed houses; also the 'Schul' was entirely demolished, the Beth Hamidrash and half of the houses on both sides of the market place. Not a single sign remained of the Tylna and Zatylna streets and of many other Jewish streets. The cemetery likewise was entirely demolished, and the tombstones employed in paving the street walks.

“Ostrowcers” in Munich pay homage to the victims of their hometown

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“Ostrowcers” in Brazil commemorate the anniversary of the annihilation of their beloved

Ostrowiec was liberated by the Red Army in January, 1945. After the liberation, Jews appeared who had hidden themselves in bunkers in town and outside its periphery. Later arrived the partisans and those who survived on Aryan papers in Warsaw, later still came the Jews from the Auschwitz Concentration Camp, Gleiwitz, Buna and Blachmir, and a Jewish congregation started coming into being.

A Jewish Committee was created with Aharon Friedental as its chairman. IT took care of restoring Jewish life in town and providing for the returning people

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who needed support in making their first steps. The suffering Jews were filled with a new hope that presently new life would start for them in a newly cleared atmosphere.

However, very soon their wings were cut and the Ostrowiec Jews realized their sad mistake. The Polish A.K. (Armja Krajowa) has on the 12^th March, 1945 organized a murderous attack on the apartment of Pinhas Lederman in the Starakunowski Street and brutally killed 5 people, who managed to survive the terrible catastrophe, and the awful dangers, wounding badly several others. The murdered ones were: the daughter of Yehezkel Krongold, who all through the war managed to hide and live on Aryan papers; Haya Sheindel Spiegel, the daughter of Naftali Spiegel, also surviving on Aryan documents through the war; Leibl Lustig, the 17 year old grandson of Reuben Spielman. He returned a few days earlier with his father from the Gleiwitz Concentration Camp. The boy implored the murderers to save him and have pity on him and he kept showing them his concentration camp number, but this did not help him. The other victim was a woman from Tshmielow who

“Ostrowcers” in Argentine paying homage to the Jewish victims in Ostrowiec

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hid during the entire war with the help of Aryan papers.

After this tragedy, the Jews desired to leave the town, but Friedental influenced them in every possible way not to do it, persuading them to stay, as Ostrowiec was, in his opinion, an important assembly point for all the Jews who passed that way and for those returning from camps. It later transpired that he was right, and Ostrowiec served in fact as a useful refuge for a certain time, for those miserable Jews who could from there set out again on their way in search of a new life.

Due to Friedental's intervention, it became possible to exhume all the Jews murdered during the Nazi occupation and bury them duly in the Jewish cemetery. Thus all those buried on Cementowa Square, in the brickworks, and at Kilinska Street, were duly brought to a Jewish burial. A public kitchen was opened and everybody could get there a free breakfast and a free lunch.

The Jews have little-by-little begun to get settled. Many have recovered their shops and houses, and have gradually restored the Jewish life in town. Many Jews from other destroyed towns, started to concentrate in Ostrowiec hoping to start there a new life.

But the outbreak of the pogrom in Kielce put an end to the Jewish dreams and they have left the town. Thus the wonderful Ostrowiec Jewry ceased to exist.

The first child born to Ostrovtser parents, Motl and Matel Pfeffer, after the Holocaust

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Today not a single Jew can be found in town. There isn't even the old cemetery: the lovely red wall and the tombstones have been totally demolished.

The only thing we are able to do in memory of the Ostrowiec Jewry is just to say the heartrending prayer: May God remember the names of the holy and innocent of the Ostrowiec town, who were killed, murdered, burnt, massacred and choked in the name of our God and our people Israel…

Let their souls survive amongst the living. Let God perpetuate their blood!

Remnants of the tombstone on the desecrated grave of the Ostrovtser Rabbi

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A vanished world…

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