At the end of the 16th century, the local Jewish community experienced rapid demographic development. Jews lived in Kraśnik mainly near the market square, as well as on Żydowska and Lubelska streets and by the town walls, where mainly butchers had their houses. The community had a synagogue, a rabbi's house, a cantor's house, a hospital, a mikvah, private baths and a Jewish cemetery located at today's Podwalna street. There was a ritual slaughterhouse in operation from at least 1605. In the mid-17th century, Jews became the only suppliers of meat for the population of Kraśnik, and they also imported colonial items.

The commune survived the difficult period of the Khmelnytsky Uprising (1648–1654), although there were pogroms and robberies at that time. In 1740, Jews received a privilege allowing them to settle and run a business in the city without restrictions. In 1787, 2,430 Jews lived in Kraśnik and they owned almost all the brick houses in the city center, as well as most of the breweries and distilleries.

In the 19th century the town became an important center of Hasidism. Rabbi Abraham Eiger, son of tzadik Yehuda Lejb Eiger, founded his court here; after his father's death, however, he moved to Lublin, where he took over the leadership of all Lublin Hasidim.

In 1883, Kraśnik had a population of over 4,000 Jews. At the end of the 19th century, they included industrial plants, including: water mill, windmill and brickyard. At the beginning of the 20th century, railway transport and maintaining the local garrison became an important source of income. During World War I, Russian soldiers killed both local rabbis.

In the interwar period, the local municipality was one of the largest in the Lublin region. Jews in Kraśnik had, among others, The Great and Small Synagogues, three houses of prayer, a mikvah, an orphanage, cheders, private houses of prayer and a cemetery. Aid organisations and cultural and educational institutions functioned.

After the outbreak of World War II, Kraśnik came under German occupation. The first repressions in 1939 took the form of intimidation; the Germans burned the books and scrolls collected in the synagogue. On their orders, a Judenrat was established, and soon a ghetto was established, which in 1940 encompassed Bóżniczna, Szkolna and Ogrodowa streets. Apart from the locals, Jews from Lublin, Kraków, and Warsaw were imprisoned there.

The ghetto was liquidated in 1942. The Germans then shot several hundred people in the cemetery at Szewska street (now Dolna street); others were transported to labor camps and the ghetto in Zaklików, from where they were later sent to the German Nazi extermination camp in Bełżec. After 1945, several Jews lived in Kraśnik for few years.

The Description

There were three cemeteries under the management of the Jewish community in Kraśnik, which were devastated during World War II by the Germans. Third in chronological terms, the so-called the new Jewish cemetery in Kraśnik is formally located in the administrative area of the Góra colony in the village of Mikulin, at Szewska street (Góra district, plot no. 1006). It is actually located on the border of the town, and the easiest way to get there is via the path marked on the maps as Dolna street. It was founded in the first half of the 19th century, covering a large area of 1.82 hectares, including an L-shaped plot. Perhaps in the 1930s, a massive, although collapsed in places, concrete wall was built, preserved to this day in long sections. The first monument to the victims of the Holocaust was erected here in 1946. It took the form of three juxtaposed cuboid elements, fenced with a low metal fence, which has survived to this day. Under the concrete elements a mass grave is probably located. On June 22, 2006, a group of 180 Israeli soldiers, in cooperation with the Kraśnik Municipality and Town Hall, tidied up the cemetery area; it was a program coordinated by the Yad LeZehava Holocaust Research Institute in collaboration with the Foundation for the Preservation of Jewish Heritage. In 2018, the old monument was replaced by a new monument, erected through the efforts of the Foundation for the Preservation of Jewish Heritage. There were dozens of fragments of broken matzevas. On July 20, 2019, the cemetery was entered into the register of monuments under the number A/1669, made by WKZ Lublin. Despite all these measures, both during the visit in 2018 and 2023, most of the cemetery area was completely overgrown with trees and bushes, to such an extent that it was impossible to inspect it.

Author of the note: Magda Lucima

Właściciel praw autorskich do opisu: Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich POLIN.