Frampol | Lublin Voivodeship

/ The school building where the German gendarmerie [police] had its post.   © Jordi Lagoutte   /Yahad-In Unum The place where the synagogue was located. It was destroyed during World War II.  © Jordi Lagoutte   /Yahad-In Unum Leon, born in 1926: “On November 3, they started to liquidate the Jews. The Germans encircled Frampol, so that the Jews couldn’t flee to the forest. Next, the German gendarmerie [police] intervened and started to shoot. Some Jews hid in cellars."© YIU Yahad-In Unum team with a witness near the execution site.  © Jordi Lagoutte   /Yahad-In Unum The Market square where the Jews were gathered before being taken to the execution site.  © Jordi Lagoutte   /Yahad-In Unum Execution site at the Jewish cemetery where from 744 to 1,000 people were murdered.  © Jordi Lagoutte   /Yahad-In Unum

Execution of Jews in Frampol

1 Execution site(s)

Kind of place before:
Jewish cemetery
Memorials:
Yes
Period of occupation:
1939-1944
Number of victims:
744 to 1,000

Witness interview

Leon, born in 1926: “First, the shooting occurred on November 3. The next day, the Jews found by the Germans were gathered at the Market square. After that, they were all taken to the cemetery in small groups. Only after the German gendarmerie [police] who conducted the shooting arrived at the place of execution. The pits had been dug in advance. Jewish children and women entered the pits and were shot with pistols. We were requisitioned to transport the bodies on carts, so we could see that they were all undressed. All these poor young Jewish women. I couldn’t hide my tears. But it felt like Germans did not have any feelings, that it did not matter for[to] them.” (Witness N°721, interviewed in Frampol, on August 15, 2017).

Polish Archives

"1. Date and place of execution: from November 2, 1942, to May 1944.

2. Type of execution (shooting, hanging or other): shooting.

3. Personal data on the executed victims (Poles, Jews, other nationalities): Jews and Poles.

Number of executed victims: 744 Jews and 8 Poles.

Origin of the victims: Frampol and its surroundings.

Names, age, occupations and addresses: different ages, including 8 Poles from 18 to 25 years of age.

[…] 8. Where were the bodies buried? Exact place: Jewish cemetery.

9. Description of the pit/pits/dimensions, number of victims per pit: three pits measuring 2m by 5m each." [Court inquiries about executions and mass grave, IPN:GK 163/12]

Historical note

Frampol is a town located 70 km south of Lublin. The first records about the Jewish community date back to the middle of the 18th century. In 1821, 100 Jews lived in Frampol. By 1864, the community grew and numbered 668 Jews. There was a Jewish cemetery and a wooden synagogue that was transformed into a brick one. According to the 1921 census, there were 1,465 Jews in Frampol, who represented a little more than a half of the town’s population. Besides Jews, Poles and Ukrainians lived in the town. Many Jews were craftsmen and shopkeepers. Some owned factories, for example a wine factory. During the interwar period, a bunch of Jewish political and cultural organizations were active in Frampol. Besides three cheders [schools] which had been opened since 1903, in 1939, a Talmud Torah school operated in Frampol.

Holocaust by bullets in figures

On September 13, 1939, the German Luftwaffe bombed Frampol destroying a majority of the town’s buildings. A big part of its population lost their homes and had to look for places to stay in nearby villages. Soon after the beginning of the German occupation, German police posts were created. According to the Polish witness interviewed by Yahad In Unum, the German gendarmerie [police] headquarters were installed in the town’s school building. Historical sources give very few details about the life of Frampol Jews under the occupation. It is known that the Jews were forbidden to leave the town and that the Judenrat was established. Most probably in August 1942 Judenrat was ordered to prepare a list of deportees. Most of the people who were warned, fled to the near town of Goraj, villages and forests. Soon they came back. Jews from Goraj, after having their houses burned by the Germans, were brought to Frampol. According to a Polish eyewitness, those who tried to flee or hide were killed. The final action started in November 1942. According to the witness, on November 3 the special German unit, together with Ukrainians, came by trucks and surrounded the town. The Germans were chasing people in the streets and shooting them. The witness saw these killings. Some 100 people who survived the shootings were gathered in the Market square and taken on trucks to Zwierzyniec. Later they were deported to the Bełżec death camp. All the others, who tried to hide, were being consequently searched by Germans and Poles, who were forced to search or did it of their own will. Groups found were gathered in a school building which served as an arrest or, according to the witness, in the Market square, and taken by the requisitioned locals to the cemetery where they were killed. According to the witness, who was one of these forced to take people to the killing site as well as to gather dead corpses, said some Jews, after days spent in hiding, could not walk and were killed on the way. At the cemetery the victims, including women, children, and elderly, were forced to undress, and killed in three pits. Victims’ clothes were searched by the Germans who also took pictures of the execution. The killings took a few days. Approximately 1,000 Jews were shot.

Nearby villages

To support the work of Yahad-in Unum please consider making a donation

Do you have additional information regarding a village that you would like to share with Yahad ?

Please contact us at contact@yahadinunum.org
or by calling Yahad – In Unum at +33 (0) 1 53 20 13 17