The World Society of Częstochowa Jews and Their Descendants (“World Society”) supports research into the history of Częstochowa Jewry. Częstochowa is a city in Southern Poland. The Jews of Częstochowa contributed significantly to the commerce, industry, and culture of Częstochowa and Poland.
The city is known for the famous Pauline monastery of Jasna Góra, which is the home of the Black Madonna painting, a shrine to the Virgin Mary. Every year, millions of pilgrims from all over the world come to Częstochowa to see it.
Before World War II, around one-third of the population of Częstochowa were Jews (almost 40,000 inhabitants). After the Germans invaded Poland in September 1939, they first confined the Jews to a ghetto and then deported them to the Treblinka death camp. Some 5,200 survived in HASAG, a forced labor camp on the outskirts of the city. My father, Abram Enzel, was among those Jews forced to work in HASAG. Today, there are fewer than 100 Jews in the city.
The World Society has discovered, translated and published a Jewish newspaper published in Częstochowa in 1936. After much research, the organization believes that only five issues of the newspaper were ever published. The first issue was published on June 21, 1936. This was more than three years before Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939. The lead article in that issue makes clear the enmity of the Poles for their Jewish neighbors:
So, it turns out that in the length and breadth of Poland, Jews have no one who understands them, who would sympathise with them, who would be able to respect their people and citizens. Our “indigenous hosts” who, at a time when they themselves were oppressed under a foreign yoke, confessed their fraternal feelings to us and assured us of a future paradise and an oasis of justice in a liberated Poland – have completely forgotten about the past. Currently, they don’t want us, they don’t like us, they cannot stand us.
This Polish antisemitism is entirely consistent with what my father recounted to me. Jewish life in Poland was not secure well before Germany invaded and occupied Poland.