The Jews in Sadagura during the Holocaust

Existing information shows that in 1842 a Jewish community was established in the city led by Rabbi Yisroel Friedman. Sadagura was then under Austrian administration. At the beginning of the 20th century, between 3,000 and 5,000 Jews lived in the town. During the interwar period, the number of Jews decreased significantly. In 1930, 1459 Jews lived here, and in 1941, 654.

The Jews of Sadagura were subjected to persecution by both the Soviets and the Germans and Romanians. In June 1941, before the withdrawal of the Soviets, Jewish merchants and businessmen were deported to Siberia for class-related reasons.

The Jews in this locality were going to experience moments of horror after the Soviets left the city on July 5th, 1941, and before the entry of Romanian and German troops. On the night of July 5th-6th, 1941, the city turned into hell for the approximately 600 Jews who still lived here.

Information about the fate of the Jews began to circulate even before the massacre. The day before, information was spreading through the town that mass executions of Jews would begin. Some of them hid in attics or fled the village. But not everyone believed these rumours.

Archive and memorial sources highlight the role played during the persecutions by Vladimir Rusu, a former teacher, who self-proclaimed as chief of police. Before July 5th-6th, 1941, he was perceived by his fellow citizens as a “decent man”, sociable and athletic, a member of the city’s football team.

After the city was abandoned by the Soviets, Vladimir Rusu put together his own “national guard”, calling himself chief of police. On the night of July 5th to 6th, accompanied by his acolytes, he began raiding Jewish homes. Following these raids, 72 men, women, and children were taken out of their homes and taken to the town hall.

According to some survivors, he told some of those picked up to “dress nicely” because they would be “going to a wedding”. At the town hall, they were placed on their stomachs, and soon the beatings began for those detained to say where they had their money, jewellery and other valuables. A witness reported after 1945 that some of the objects appropriated by Rusu were later worn by his fiancée.

From the town hall they were transported by Vladimir Rusu’s teams to a nearby hill where they were shot. At his behest, former co-workers or even his own students were shot. One survivor stated: “I know that Rusu did not spare his friends as was the case with the Jew Schaffer, with whom he was a good friend and played football on the same team, just as he did not spare his students that he had at the school in the town when he was a teacher, which he also executed”.

Survivors’ testimonies also show that some women and girls were raped by the killers before they were killed. At the same time, one of the victims, before being shot, had her finger cut off, which had a ring on it. No small children or infants were spared. Only those Jews who were not in the village that night escaped execution. Some of them captured a few days later, were later shot. Clara Blum mentioned: “Although my brother was able to escape on the night of the massacre, two days later he went out on the street and was seen by Vladimir Rusu’s men and taken to Jucica Noua in an abandoned house where he was shot by three others citizens”.

The next day, the Jews who were not shot were gathered again and brought to the town hall. Here, a local committee began to identify those known as communists or suspected of having communist sympathies. Those discovered as communists by the local committee were deported from the town. The others were allowed to return to their homes. In the following period, they were used for forced labour by local authorities, such as street cleaning. After a few months, however, in August 1941, all the Jews from Sadagura were gathered again in the schoolyard and were deported to the Transnistrian camps by the Romanian authorities.

In Sadagura, a temporary camp also operated for a few months. Between August and October 1941, about 1,500 Jews deported from Chernivtsi were temporarily interned in the Sadagura camp. The camp also functioned the following year, with Jews from Bukovina being interned here or deportees brought from Videle camp, Teleorman county, and even Jews suspected of communist activities.

AINSHR-EW, Fond 25.004, Rola 15, Dosar 1241, vol. 1

Ovidu Creangă, Sădăgura, in Geoffrey P. Megargee (general editor), Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos 1933-1945, Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2018, pp. 750-751

Marius Mircu, Pogromurile din Bucovina și Dorohoi [The Pogroms in Bukovina and Dorohoi], București, Editura Glob, 1945, pp. 61-65. 

Ilanit Chernick, Memorial unveiled for Ukrainian Jews massacred in Holocaust, accessible at https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/memorial-for-ukrainian-jews-massacred-in-holocaust-unveiled-596998