The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933-1945

Pre-1939: Werba, village, województwo wołyńskie, Poland; 1939–1941: Verba, raion center, Rovno oblast’, Ukrainian SSR; 1941–1944: Werba, Rayon center, Gebiet Dubno, Generalkommissariat Wolhynien und Podolien; post-1991: Verba, Dubno raion, Rivne oblast’, Ukraine

Werba is located about 18 kilometers (11.2 miles) southwest of Dubno. According to the 1921 census, there were 228 Jews living in Werba (57 percent of the total population). By the [End Page 1491] middle of 1941, allowing for a natural increase of 9 to 10 persons per thousand per year, there would have been around 270 Jews living there.

Units of the German 6th Army occupied Werba on June 24, 1941. In July and August 1941, a military commandant’s office (Ortskommandantur) ran the village. In September 1941, authority was transferred to a German civil administration. Werba was incorporated into Gebiet Dubno. Nachwuchsführer Brocks became the Gebietskommissar, and Gendarmerie-Leutnant Eberhardt was appointed as the Gendarmerie-Gebietsführer in 1942.¹ A Gendarmerie post and a Ukrainian police unit were established in Werba.

In the summer and fall of 1941, the German authorities introduced a series of antisemitic measures in Werba. The Jews were ordered to wear distinguishing markings, initially armbands bearing the Star of David, later, two yellow patches, to be worn one on their chest and one on the back of their clothing. The Jews had to perform forced labor, and they were not permitted to leave the limits of the village. The German authorities also ordered the establishment of a Jewish Council (Judenrat), which was responsible for assigning Jews to forced labor tasks. Sometimes those sent out to perform forced labor did not return. Forced labor tasks included chopping wood for the Germans and agricultural work. No schools were permitted by the German authorities, but Jewish children still went clandestinely to Hebrew school in the teacher’s house.²

On May 20, 1942, the German authorities established a ghetto in the town on two streets. Jews from neighboring villages also were resettled there. In total, there were 367 Jews in the ghetto.³ Accounts of survivors differ on whether there was a fence surrounding the ghetto. The ghetto inmates suffered from severe overcrowding, with around 10 people sharing a single room and others crammed into attics and sleeping on floors. There was no running water in the ghetto houses, and all water had to be collected from the well. No ration cards were issued to the Jews, but some Jews were able to sneak out and obtain food, such as bread, potatoes, and butter, from Czech colonists living nearby. The craftsmen and their families lived in a separate section of the ghetto apart from the rest of the Jews. The ghetto was guarded by the Ukrainian police who imposed a strict curfew and were tougher on the Jews than the few Germans based in the village.⁴

On May 30, 1942, the Germans conducted an Aktion against the Jews in the ghetto, resulting in around 285 Jews being shot near the village of Granovka.⁵ The mass shooting was carried out by an SD detachment from Równe, with the assistance of a platoon from the 1st Company of the 33rd Reserve Police Battalion.⁶

The craftsmen and their families in the separate section of the ghetto were not shot at the end of May. After the Aktion, the German authorities promised not to kill those who had survived, and the few Jews who had hidden themselves successfully joined the craftsmen in the remnant ghetto. However, in August 1942, the German and Ukrainian police conducted a second Aktion, shooting the remaining Jews. Including those discovered and shot in searches just after the Aktion, around 80 more Jews were arrested and shot.⁷

Some Jews managed to escape from the ghetto in time, most of them hiding and working with local peasants. However, some of these Jews were betrayed and subsequently killed; only a few survived until the return of the Red Army in March 1944.