Zawiercie is a town in the province of Katowice, southern Poland.

             Initially a village and station on the railway line Warsaw-Vienna. Zawiercie became a town in 1895 and developed into an industrial centre. Jews made a considerable contribution to its growth.

             Jews were living in Zawiercie since 1847, when a few dozen families there received community services from the neighboring town let of Kromolow.

             The local community began to be organized in the 1860's when hundreds of Jewish workers found jobs in the local factories and were joined by their families. By 1895, the community served the Jewish population in the neighboring towns and villages as well as in Zawiercie.

             After the completion of the central synagogue in 1880 the Rabbi of Kromolow, Yehuda Leib Gansweich moved to Zawiercie and served as the local Rabbi. His successors were Rabbi Nathan Nachum Hacohen Rabinowitz, the Admor of Kromolow, and his son Rabbi Shlomo Elimelech Rabinowitz, who became chief Rabbi and President of the Beth Hadin (Jewish Religious Court) of Zawiercie and the district.

             In the 1890's the first Jewish Public School Yesod Hatorah, was founded: Also a Talmud Torah school for the poorer section of the community. After the First World War two more Jewish schools were opened: Hamizrachi and Hatarbut. Instructions were given in Hebrew and in Polish. In 1902 the community came to the aid of refugees from the pogrom in the town of Czestochowa (Chenstokhov) and assisted victims of the epidemic which swept the area that summer.

             Several local charity funds were set up to help the Jews of Zawiercie, particularly in times of economic crises.

             In the 1840's many residents of Zawiercie earned their living in the saw mills which were Jewish owned. In the 1860's the Ginsburg brothers founded a textile factory which attracted thousands of workers to the town. By 1880 the population of Zawiercie numbered some 15000. New factories were manufacturing glass, bricks, chemical and cast iron. In the 1895 the population of the town totaled about 20000, including more than 2000 Jews, most of whom were working in the local factories as clerks, in managements and as technicians. The majority of the shops in the town's central market were owned by Jews.

             The economic progress of the citizens of Zawiercie in general and the Jews in particular was adversely affected by the Russian revolution of 1905 and by the economic boycott against the Polish Jews of Russia in 1912.

             During the First World War Zawiercie was close to the battlefield. The Jews, many of whom were small traders, provided services to the armed forces which passed through the town. After the war Zawiercie recovered thanks to its economic infra-structure and co-operation between Poles and Jews.

             The Zionist Organization of Zawiercie was founded in the 1880's as a sequel to Chibat Zion. It was headed by Avraham Borshtein, a member of the community council and eventually its Chairman and Deputy Mayor of the town. Many Jews were active supporters of the Zionist Federation and of Aliya (immigration) to the Land of Israel. The first immigrants from Zawiercie arrived in Eretz Israel in the 1920's. Zionist Youth Organizations such as Hakoach, Herzlia, and Hashomer Hatzair began to set up during the First World War. They were joined in the 1920's by Betar, Mizrachi Youth and Agudat Israel.

             Poles and Jews were active side by side in the local branch of the Polish Socialist Party and in the Labor Union (set up in Zawiercie in 1895).

             Between the two World Wars Jewish communal life in Zawiercie centered on the Zionist Movement and the Youth Movement. Theatrical groups, an orchestra, choir and several artists were active within the same framework.

             In 1939 the town had about 40000 inhabitants; nearly 10000 were Jewish.

The Holocaust 

            Zawiercie was occupied by German troops on September 3, 1939. The residents had to present themselves at the big textile factory where the German separated the Jews from the Poles and detained them in harsh conditions for about two weeks. Orders issued by the German commandant of the town placed the factories of Zawiercie in the service of the German armed forces, obliged the young citizens of the town to perform forced labor in the area and imposed restrictions on the Jews. A "Judenrat" (Jewish Council appointed by the Germans) was created and made responsible for the implementation of these orders among the Jewish Population.

        In the summer of 1940 some young Jews organized themselves in order to escape to the Soviet Union. Most of the refugees found shelter there until the end of the war.

        In October 1940, the young Jews of the community were conscripted for forced labor in Germany. The first group was taken there on the 11^th of that month and the second in May 1941.

        In 1941 the Jewish streets of Zawiercie were transformed into a Ghetto. The only persons allowed to leave or enter were holders of work permits. Jews from Silesia and Czechoslovakia who worked for the German army and Jews from the small towns in the neighborhood of Zawiercie were brought to this Ghetto.

         Overcrowding and food shortage led to the spread of sickness and disease. A hospital was set up in the courtyard of the Kromolow Rabbi.

          In 1943, there were about 600 Jews in the Ghetto. In August of that year, most of them were sent to extermination camp in Auschwitz. Among them the last Rabbi of the town, Shlomo Elimelech Rabinowitz, who was killed by the Germans, when he was taken from Auschwitz to Dachau.