CHERKASSY
Pre-1941: Cherkassy, city, Kiev oblast’, Ukrainian SSR; 1941–1943: Tscherkassy, Rayon center, Gebiet Smela, Generalkommissariat Kiew; post-1991: Cherkasy, oblast’ center, Ukraine
Cherkassy is located 26.5 kilometers (16.5 miles) south of Zolotonosha. In 1939, there were 7,637 Jews living in Cherkassy.
The Germans captured Cherkassy on August 22, 1941, but the majority of the Jewish population was evacuated or managed to flee before the German advance. Much of the city was destroyed in the fighting. The military administration organized the registration of the Jews and ordered them to wear distinctive armbands. The military administration also ordered the establishment of a Jewish Committee consisting of three people that was to take responsibility for the actions of the Jewish community and to pass on German instructions. Initially the Jews still lived in their homes or with relatives if their houses had been occupied or destroyed. Jews ages 15 to 65 were taken by the Ukrainian police to perform menial labor tasks. Some Jews were also robbed by the Ukrainian police.1
In October 1941, a German civil administration assumed authority from the military. Cherkassy became a Rayon center in Gebiet Smela. The Gebietskommissar in Smela was Regierungsrat Schwehr.2
On October 10, 1941, the German authorities ordered the creation of a ghetto (“Jewish residential district”) near the customs office within two days, which was supervised by the Ukrainian Rayon administration and the Ukrainian police. The ghetto consisted of just three streets. Approximately 900 ghetto inmates, including women and children, were deployed for cleaning the streets. In November or December 1941, the Security Police from Kiev (Einsatzkommando 5), the Gendarmerie, and the Ukrainian police liquidated the ghetto, murdering the majority of its Jewish inhabitants. According to some sources, there was a further Aktion in early 1942, when almost all of the remaining Jewish population was murdered.3
With the help of a friend, the Ukrainian woman Aleksandra Shulezhko organized a Children’s Home for orphans, which by the end of 1942 had collected about 100 children, some 25 of whom were Jews. She saved the Jewish children by changing their names and nationalities when registering them. The Red Army recaptured the city on December 14, 1943. Yad Vashem honored Shulezhko as a person “Righteous Among the Nations” for her work.4
SOURCES
Information on the Holocaust in the city of Cherkassy can be found in the following archives: DAChO (R49-1-20); DAKiO (4758-2-52); GARF; TsDAHOU (166-3-256; 62-9-4); USHMM (RG-50.226); and YVA (M-31, M-33, and M-52).
NOTES
1. USHMM, RG-50.226 # 0024, interview with Dmitri Mironenko.
2. BA-BL, BDC, SSHO 2432, Organisationsplan der besetzten Ostgebiete nach dem Stand vom 10. März 1942, hg. vom Chef der Ordnungspolizei, Berlin, March 13, 1942, p. 25.
3. TsDAHOU, 166-3-256, p. 1; 62-9-4, pp. 157–58; DAChO, R49-1-20, p. 10. DAKiO, 4758-2-52, p. 43 reverse side, indicates that the liquidation of the ghetto took place in November 1941 with more than 300 victims. See also Shmuel Spector and Geoffrey Wigoder, eds., The Encyclopedia of Jewish Life before and during the Holocaust (Jerusalem: Yad Vashem; New York: New York University Press, 2001), pp. 246–247.
4. YVA, M-31. See also the useful article by Esther Rechtshafner, “Research on Cherkassy,” available at www.jewishgen.org/Ukraine/Kiev/chergassy/cherkassy_3.htm.
