Overview
History of Przedecz’s Jewish Community
Sources: Pinkas Hakehillot Polin: Przedecz and Memorial Book to the Holocaust Victims of the City of Pshaytsh
Called Pshaysth in Yiddish and Przedecz in Polish, the town is located on shores of Lake Przedecz, and traces its origins to the 12th century. The first Jews to settle in the town probably arrived there at the end of the 14th century. By 1793, Jews made up 139 of the shtetl’s 355 residents. At the beginning of the 19th century, Przedecz became an independent kehila that included the Jewish communities of surrounding towns such as Izbica Kujawska, Klowdawa and Dabrowice. As elsewhere in the region and in Poland as a whole, the beginning of the 20th century brought an awakening of social and cultural life in the town. In 1939, Przedecz had 769 Jewish residents. The German army entered the town in September 1939. During 1940, the Germans sent about half of the Przedecz Jews to forced labor camps around Poznan. The Jews remaining in Przedecz were sent to their deaths at the Chelmno extermination camp between April 21 and 24, 1942. READ MORE from the Pinkas Hakehillot Polin: Przedecz and READ MORE from the Memorial Book to the Holocaust Victims of the City of Pshaytsh
Resources
- JRI-Poland Town Page for Przedecz
- “Roberta’s Family Lived in Pshaytsh” from ADJCP President Marysia Galbraith’s Uncovering Jewish Heritage blog
- Survey of the Pzedecz Jewish Cemetery by the European Jewish Cemeteries Initiative, including photos of its recent condition
- Entry for the Przedecz Ghetto in the US Holocaust Memorial Museum Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, 1933-1945, Volume II
