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2 Killing site(s)
Marian S., born in 1930: “Further down the ravine, in Cyców, Jews were shot and buried. It happened in a field near the house of a wealthy German who owned fishponds, close to the Evangelical church. I remember one winter when Jews were frequently transported there on sledges belonging to the villagers. The sledges passed along the road by the Evangelical church and the pastor’s house. The Germans drove the Jews into the ravine, where a pit had been dug by local peasants. Some of the Jews were shot while lying down in the pit, others while standing. Some were still wearing their clothes, others had been stripped. On my way home from school, I could hear the gunfire. The Germans shot each victim one by one, using small rifles and machine guns. The executions began in late autumn, continued through the winter, and lasted into the spring.” [Testimony N°YIU81P, interviewed in Wólka Cycowska, on August 16, 2011]
Cyców is a village in eastern Poland, located in Łęczna County, approximately 45 km east of Lublin and 218 km southeast of Warsaw.
The exact date of the establishment of a Jewish presence in Cyców is not well documented, but larger-scale settlement began in the second half of the 19th century. At that time, Jewish merchants from Kalisz purchased the village and subdivided part of the land, inviting German settlers to the area. In 1882, some of these settlers repurchased land in the neighboring village of Kolonia Cyców. Two years later, in 1884, the estate was acquired by Wolf Wajnsztok and Izaak Lichtenbaum from Warsaw, who completed the subdivision and sale of the land.
As a result, during the interwar period, Cyców became a multi-ethnic, multi-religious, and economically vibrant center of local trade and services. In this context, the Jewish community played a significant role in the village’s economic development. Until World War I, the Jews of Cyców were part of the religious community in Siedliszcze; after its dissolution in 1915, they were incorporated into the Jewish community of Łęczna. Since 1916, a private beit ha-midrash operated in Cyców, established by Mordek Heryng.
During the interwar years, Jews made up more than 20% of Cyców’s population and were both economically and socially active. The village center was home to numerous Jewish-owned businesses, including grocery stores, a shoe store, a hardware store, and a bakery. Jewish entrepreneurs owned commercial enterprises and factories, such as a steam mill, a motor oil press, and a windmill run by a horse and cattle trading company. Many Jewish merchants also participated in the regional and national leather trade.
According to the 1921 census, Cyców had 852 inhabitants. The largest group was ethnic Germans, and the religious composition of the population was as follows: 321 Evangelicals, 181 Jews, 175 Orthodox Christians, and 174 Roman Catholics. While the exact number of Jews living in Cyców in 1939 is unknown, local witnesses recall a significant Jewish community that played a dominant role in the village’s trade and commerce.
With the beginning of the German occupation of Cyców in mid-September 1939, the town was incorporated into Chełm County within the Lublin District of the General Government. A local gendarmerie post was established on the second floor of the town office.
From the early days of the occupation, Cyców’s Jewish population grew significantly due to an influx of refugees from surrounding villages, and in 1940, by the arrival of hundreds of Jews from Piaski Luterskie. As a result, by 1941 there were 511 Jews residing in the town. In April 1942, they were confined to a ghetto, which at its peak held 538 individuals.
According to local witnesses, members of the local gendarmerie—including Polish-speaking Volksdeutsche—were responsible for several shootings of Jews, Roma, and Poles in Cyców. A young Jewish man who had served the gendarmes for some time was executed in the town center. Several other individual shootings of Jews occurred in the area behind the gendarmerie building. During a period spanning from winter to spring—likely in 1942—Jews were transported by sledge to a field near the fishponds, where they were executed and buried in a pit dug along a ravine.
The main Aktion against the Jewish population of Cyców began on May 5, 1942, during the initial phase of the ghetto’s liquidation. Several Jews were killed on the spot. The persecution resumed later that month. According to Polish archives, on May 27, 1942, German police carried out a mass execution of 160 Jews and 3 Poles in the neighboring village of Wólka Cycowska, near the local shooting range.A local witness recounted that a German unit arrived in Cyców by car and truck, bringing Jews from other localities with them. These Jews, along with the remaining local Jewish residents, were initially assembled at the village fire station. One elderly Jewish man, who refused to leave his home, was shot in his yard and buried there by local villagers. At the end of the day, the group gathered at the fire station was taken approximately 1 km away to the shooting range in Wólka Cycowska, where they were executed.
Following the mass shooting, in early June 1942, the remaining Jews in Cyców were deported—loaded onto horse-drawn wagons or trucks—and sent to the Sobibor death camp, located about 45 km to the northeast. They were murdered upon arrival.
Two killing sites in Cyców identified by Yahad – In Unum remain unmarked and un-commemorated to this day. The commemorated killing site of 160 Jews transported to and executed in Wólka Cycowska is detailed in a separate record.
For more information about the killing sites in Wólka Cycowska, please refer to the corresponding profile.
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