The Liquidation of the Jews of Zmigrod

The Churban of Zmigrod

Phase 1

Chana Laks
Debi Reece

My father-in-law, Mr. Naftali Laks z”l, was born in 1922 in the town of Nowy Zmigrod which is part of the Galicia area of Poland.  He survived several concentration camps, emigrated to Palestine/Israel after the war, and eventually settled in the United States.  He spent his last years with my husband and myself in Passaic and was niftar November 2024.

The Germans invaded Poland on September 1, 1939 and overran the country within weeks.  Poland was divided, with the Russians controlling the eastern half and the Germans, the west, where Zmigrod is situated.  Mr. Laks was 17 years old.  All of Zmigrod followed the unfolding events as closely as possible.  The school principal owned the only radio in town.  He stationed the radio at a window and people would gather to hear the news.  Planes flew overhead--a major event for Zmigrod.  A school teacher told the residents that these were Polish planes, but the truth came out later that the war planes were German.   

The Jews had few illusions about the German plans for them.  Mr. Laks and a cousin tried to flee eastwards towards the Russian zone of Poland but the German army advanced faster.  They were overtaken by the German army and told to return home.  Rivka, Mr. Laks’s mother, and the family prepared for the impending catastrophe as best as they could.  False papers were acquired for the daughters, to allow them to pass for non-Jewish Poles with the last name Laksovna.  Aunt Fradl's daughter, Chana, living in Yaslow, procured a false document to certify that Mr. Laks was a trained tailor.

The Germans arrived in Zmigrod shortly before Rosh Hashana in 1939.   On Rosh Hashana, men came to daven in shul and were chased out by German soldiers.  A few hours later, the SS arrived.  Had they found any Jews in shul, they would likely have killed them, as happened in other towns. 

It was around this time that the Lublin ghetto was set up.  All the Jews in this city were herded into the ghetto zone, which was located in an undesirable part of the city.  The poorer Jews had been living in that section.  These Jews were expelled from their homes to make room for the more prosperous Jews from the nicer parts of the city--their houses were now the desirable residences and their former occupants were forced into the country side, including to Zmigrod.  Eighty years later, Mr. Laks was very indignant at this injustice as he shared the story. The Laks family hosted such a family on a Friday night.  When they served the chicken soup, a little girl asked for the little square noodles that she was used to.  The Lakses were taken aback--these noodles were considered a luxury item by Zmigrod standards.  Apparently, even the poor in Lublin lived better than the people of Zmigrod.

The Jews were now required to wear a yellow star with the word "Jude" whenever they went outdoors.  When Germany invaded the Soviet Union, the Germans confiscated all fur since they needed warmer garments for the colder northern climate.  Moreover, they forbade Jews from owning fur.  The Germans also prohibited any kind of gatherings, including for prayer.  Nevertheless, Jews risked their lives to pray together clandestinely in private homes.  

Able-bodied men, including Mr. Laks, were rounded up for forced labor for the next two and a half years, until the summer of 1942.  The work was unpleasant and very strenuous and Mr. Laks contracted pneumonia.  His family tried to bring him to the hospital in Jaslow for medical treatment, but were turned back because the Germans had forbidden hospitals from treating Jews.  A local physician treated his very high fever by having him take cold baths.  This treatment was successful and Mr. Laks recovered after his family had given up hope.  The doctor told Rivka that Mr. Laks would never be able to perform hard labor again.

A middle-aged German soldier, a former policeman who had been drafted into the army, was quartered with the Laks family.  He was a decent man and he became friends with the family.  Rivka cooked him a goose to bring home with him when he was given time off, and he brought back with him a useful but illegal gift.  Eventually, he was sent to the Eastern Front and they never heard from him again.

Life was bearable most of the time, except when the SS was in town.  Mr. Laks remembered how they could tell what kind of Shabbos they would have, depending on whether they spotted SS vehicles at the German headquarters.  However, in the summer of 1942, the Nazis decided to start eliminating the Jews of Zmigrod.  This was done in two stages, about 6 weeks apart.  

The first stage took place on Tuesday, the 22 of Tamuz, (July 7, 1942).  Mr. Laks mentioned in his last years that every single day, he remembers the events of that day.  The Jews knew a few days earlier that something very bad was going to happen.  The previous Shabbos had been hot and on Shabbos afternoon, Jews sat on the stoops outside their homes to cool off.  As they sat outside, they noticed Germans driving through town pointing at them as though noting the location of their homes.  This was seen as ominous.  People had heard that the Germans were systematically going through other small towns in the area and liquidating their Jewish inhabitants.

The community learned of the Nazi plans since a directive was issued in advance that everyone must assemble on Tuesday.  A public fast day was declared on Monday.  Everyone fasted, including the children.  In private homes, the full customary features of prayer on a fast day were observed: reading from the Torah, recital of Slichos and Avinu Malkeinu.  Mr. Laks was surprised to see how Gershon Meizner, his neighbor across the street was crying loudly and profusely as he prayed, given that this was not a particularly pious youth.  Later on, Mr. Laks wondered whether Gershon had a premonition that he and his entire family would be executed the following day.

On Tuesday morning, the Jews gathered in Zmigrod's large soccer field.  Everyone over age 60 had to go to the left side of the field.  A member of the Gestapo holding a cane with a curved top walked around the rest of the Jews who were standing for hours in the hot sun.  He used the curved section of cane to pull out Jews at random, forcing them also to the left side.  Rivka was sent by him to stand among those waiting for execution.  

The remaining Jews had to line up at a table manned by German officers.  One by one, they would decide whether each Jewish person should be allowed to live or be sent to die. Mr. Laks saw that even his peers, young able-bodied men, were being sent to the killing area, including his best friend.  When his turn came, Mr. Laks presented his (false) certificate showing that he was a trained tailor.   Mr. Laks never forgot the words of the German commandant:

“Gluck hast du, dass du ein Schneider bist”--You are lucky you are a tailor.  The piece of paper from his cousin (she herself perished) saved his life.

Mr. Laks's youngest sister, Golda/Zahava (after the war, she went by Zahava) approached the German commander with a request.  Could her mother be spared?  "We are all sewing," she explained, "and we will be more productive if our mother continues to cook for us."  Golda took a tremendous risk in making this request.  Miraculously, rather than telling Golda to join her mother on the left side, the man acceded, and Rivka was allowed to return to the right side of the soccer field.  She was the only person who was allowed that day to return from the dead to the living.

Throughout that day, trucks drove to and from the soccer field, driving Jews to be killed in the forest of Halbow.  The previous week, townspeople had noticed that a large contingent of Polish men were driven out of town on trucks.  They later realized that these Poles were digging a huge mass grave in the forest.  The Jews were made to strip, line up in front of the pit, and then were shot.  The bodies fell into the deep trench, lime was poured over the corpses, and more trucks would drive up to repeat the procedure.  Half of the Jewish population of Zmigrod was killed that day.  In the 1990's, a monument was erected at the site to commemorate the massacre.

When Mr. Laks, his mother and his sisters returned home much later in the day, they heard the sound of their friends and neighbors weeping over family members who had been taken to be killed.  Among those murdered that day were Mr. Laks's aunts Miriam and Fradl and his uncle Chaim Sholom. 

A few days later,  SS tried to burn down the beautiful, ancient shul building but the stonework wouldn't burn.  The Jews were forced to tear down their shul, stone by stone, by hand.

In later years, Mr. Laks observed the 22 of Tamuz as the yahrzeit of his uncle and aunts--and of his hometown, Zmigrod, faithfully reciting Kaddish for all.