![Stanislaw S., born in 1922: "One of my relatives, Maria Wysocka, had a Jewish neighbor called Menda. Maria, with help of another woman, Stasia Kowalska, arranged a kennkarte [work permit] for Menda and she survived.” ©Jordi Lagoutte/Yahad - In Unum](/thumb/cache/2239f26349aef4310e9588c95da54fc9/94319/media_fichier_YIU_PO18_J11-19-08-2017_LUBLIN_Bilgoraj_Pawlowka_T731-4.jpg)
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1 Killing site(s)
Witness interview Stanislaw S., born in 1922: “There were two German operations in the village, one in June and another in October. In one house, a Jewish family lived—about twelve people in total, including children, young people, and the elderly. The Germans killed them all inside the house.” [Testimony N°YIU731P, interviewed in Pawłówka, on August 19, 2017]
"In the autumn of 1943 Germans from Rachanie came to Pawłówka. They surrounded the estate and found two Jews in the pigsty. The other Germans found three Jews in the orchard. One escaped. All five were shot in the forest. The servants of the manor were ordered to bury them where they had been shot." [IPN Lu 501/70, Questionnaire of the District Commission in Lublin to Investigate the Nazi Crimes, collected in 1968-1973 concerning places and facts of Nazi crimes on the territory of Tomaszow Lubelski district. Based on the testimony of Nazarewicz, Miedziak Hipolit].
Pawłówka is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Rachanie, located in eastern Poland. It lies approximately 2 km (1 mile) south of Rachanie, 12 km (7 miles) northeast of Tomaszów Lubelski, and 107 km (66 miles) southeast of the regional capital, Lublin.
According to the 1921 census, the village had 84 houses and a population of 487, consisting of 423 Poles, 56 Ukrainians, and 8 Jews. The local Jewish residents maintained connections with the larger Jewish communities in Komarów and Łaszczów. A local witness recalls six Jewish families living in Pawłówka before the war, primarily engaged in small-scale trade.
Education in Pawłówka was shared by children of all backgrounds—Jewish, Ukrainian, and Polish—who attended the same five-class school in the village.
German troops occupied the district in September 1939, though they did not establish a presence in Pawłówka itself. A gendarmerie post and a Schutzpolizei unit were set up in the nearby town of Rachanie. Little is known about the experiences of the Jewish residents of Pawłówka during the early years of the occupation. However, a witness interviewed by Yahad confirmed that Jewish families were allowed to remain in their homes until 1942.
In June 1942, gendarmes from Rachanie carried out several executions in Pawłówka. First, approximately ten people accused of resistance activities were publicly executed. On the same day, the gendarmes killed more than ten members of at least two Jewish families from the village. The Hamycia family was murdered in their home, and their bodies were buried in trenches dug at the start of the war by army soldiers. Hamycia himself was taken to the Pawłówka forest, where he was executed. Another Jewish family was also killed near these same trenches and subsequently buried there. After the war, the bodies of the Jewish victims were exhumed from the trenches.
A second execution of Pawłówka’s Jewish residents occurred in October 1943 on a local estate. Rachanie gendarmes discovered five Jewish men working on the farm and killed them. According to Polish archives, the victims were buried in the Pawłówka forest, with their bodies exhumed after the war. Further historical research has identified some of the victims: among the five Jews killed on the farm were Solko (or Szolko) Aksztein and his son, Josko Aksztein. Additionally, three Aksztein children—Rafka, Jankiel, and Balka—were murdered in Pawłówka, likely in 1943.
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