• Holocaust Memorials and Regional Museum Nowogrodek
Prior to World War II, Nowogrodek (Polish: Nowogródek, Belarusian: Navahrudak, Russian: Novogrudok) was home to over 5,000 Jews. Most of them were murdered during the war, yet a few hundred were able to survive in the forest as members of a Jewish partisan group. Since the 1990s, several memorials have been erected in Nowogrodek, which is now in Belarus, serving as reminders of the town's Jewish history and commemorating its murdered Jews.
Image: Nowogrodek, about 1925, Town square, Stiftung Denkmal
Nowogrodek, about 1925, Town square, Stiftung Denkmal

Image: Near Nowogrodek, 1993, Memorial at the site of the first mass shooting, donated by Jack Kagan, Jack Kagan
Near Nowogrodek, 1993, Memorial at the site of the first mass shooting, donated by Jack Kagan, Jack Kagan
Before World War I, Nowogrodek was part of the Russian Empire; from 1921 on, it was part of the newly established Polish Republic. In the interwar period, the town had a population of 10,000, half of which was Jewish - most of whom spoke Yiddish - while the other half consisted of Poles and Belarusians. Nowogrodek was a centre of Jewish life and was home to numerous Jewish institutions such as schools, orphanages, sport clubs and synagogues. On September 17, 1939, the Soviet Union occupied eastern Poland, including Nowogrodek. Many of the Jews welcomed the Soviet troops, relieved to have thus escaped occupation by the German Wehrmacht. However, in the following months many citizens of Nowogrodek, including many Jews, fell victim to Soviet terror: they were expropriated, arrested or deported to Siberia.
After the German attack on the Soviet Union, Nowogrodek was occupied by the Wehrmacht on July 4, 1941. The occupying forces immediately introduced anti-Jewish measures: already on July 26, members of the SS shot 52 men on the town square. At the beginning of December 1941, the German occupation authorities established a ghetto for the Jewish population. Yet before the Jews moved into the ghetto, German units shot at least 3,000 of them in the nearby village of Skrzydlewo. The town's remaining Jews had to move into the ghetto, and later into a labour camp. Only a few hundred Jews remained alive after two further mass shootings. Some 200 Jews managed to escape from the labour camp through a tunnel they had dug themselves. Most of them joined an armed Jewish resistance group which operated nearby - the »Bielski partisans«, named after its leaders Tuvia, Zus and Asael Bielski. Their utmost aim was to save as many Jews as possible. When the region was liberated by the Red Army in the summer of 1944, over 1,200 Jews had survived with the Bielski partisans.
Image: Nowogrodek, about 1925, Town square, Stiftung Denkmal
Nowogrodek, about 1925, Town square, Stiftung Denkmal

Image: Near Nowogrodek, 1993, Memorial at the site of the first mass shooting, donated by Jack Kagan, Jack Kagan
Near Nowogrodek, 1993, Memorial at the site of the first mass shooting, donated by Jack Kagan, Jack Kagan
Of the over 5,000 Jews who lived in Nowogrodek before the war, only a few hundred survived the Holocaust. In July 1941, 52 Jewish men were shot. Three more mass shootings followed, in the course of which German SS and Wehrmacht units assisted by Belarusian and Lithuanian militias murdered almost the entire Jewish population: on December 8, 1941, August 7, 1942, and May 7, 1943. Dozens of labour camp prisoners died on September 26, 1943, when the guards opened fire on them after their escape through the tunnel.
Image: Nalibocka forest, 1943, An armed group of Bielski partisans, Yad Vashem
Nalibocka forest, 1943, An armed group of Bielski partisans, Yad Vashem

Image: Near Nowogrodek, 1992, Soviet memorial at the site of the first mass shooting, Jack Kagan
Near Nowogrodek, 1992, Soviet memorial at the site of the first mass shooting, Jack Kagan
After the war, Nowogrodek became part of the Soviet Union, and the Polish population was for the most part expelled. Immediately after the liberation by the Red Army, a few hundred Jews who had survived with the Bielski partisans returned to the town. Yet there was little left for them to start a new life - the city was destroyed and most of their relatives had been murdered. Most of the Jews did not want to be citizens of the Soviet Union following their experiences in the years 1939 to 1941, and so they emigrated in 1946; many eventually settled in Israel. In the 1960s, Soviet memorials were erected at the sites of mass shootings, though the inscriptions failed to specify that the victims had been Jewish. The centuries of Jewish history in Nowogrodek fell into oblivion. It was only after the collapse of the Soviet Union that many of Nowogrodek's former citizens visited their home town. Jack Kagan, who survived with the Bielski partisans and now lives in London, donated several new Holocaust memorials which were erected at the sites of the mass graves.
Since the 1990s, the regional museum has dealt with the Jewish history of the town and continues to commemorate the murdered Jews. Part of the exhibition is dedicated to the conditions in the ghetto, the construction of the escape tunnel, and the Bielski partisans. The museum is also responsible for preserving the remains of a base of the Bielski partisans, located in the nearby Nalibocka forest.
In April 2012, the Foundation Memorial to the murdered Jews of Europe will publish the autobiography of Jack Kagan, for the first time in German.
Image: Nowogrodek, 2007, View of the exhibition at the regional museum, Navahrudski histaritchna-krayasnautchi musey
Nowogrodek, 2007, View of the exhibition at the regional museum, Navahrudski histaritchna-krayasnautchi musey

Image: Nalibocka forest, 1992, Jack Kagan in front of living quarters at a former base of the Bielski partisans, Jack Kagan
Nalibocka forest, 1992, Jack Kagan in front of living quarters at a former base of the Bielski partisans, Jack Kagan
Name
Musej ewrejskogo soprotiwlenija w Nowogrudke
Address
Grodnenskaya 2
231400 Navahrudak
Phone
+375 (0)1597 449 16
Web
www.navagrudak.museum.by
E-Mail
ukngkm@mail.ru
Open
Tuesday to Sunday 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Possibilities
Guided tours, lectures, excursions, conferences and seminars