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Garwolin Jewish Cemetery

Cemetery Information

Country
Poland
Region
Masovian Voivodeship
District
Garwolin
Settlement
Sulbiny Górny
Site address
Adjacent to Warszawska Street.
GPS coordinates
51.8703903, 21.6460919
Perimeter length
1006 metres
Is the cemetery demolished
no
Type and height of existing fence
No fence
Preservation condition
Unfenced Jewish cemetery
General site condition
The Jewish cemetery is situated on a a relatively large area in the village of Sulbiny Górny (called “Sulbiny” in the area), south of the town centre of Garwolin. The cemetery was established early in the 19th century. Nowadays, the territory of the cemetery is covered with a pine forest and some areas are overgrown with dense bushes. A small stream delineates the northern border of the cemetery area. Several dozen tombstones have been preserved.
Number of existing gravestones
10
Date of oldest tombstone
1863, 1881
Date of newest tombstone
1919, 1934
Urgency of erecting a fence
High
Land ownership
Forestry
Preserved construction on site
No
Drone surveys
No

Historical overview

Jewish settlement in Garwolin began towards the end of the 18th century. In 1912, 4,141 Jews (57% of the total population) lived in the town, and 2,424 Jews (47.7%) lived there in 1921. Most of them were deported to Parysów in November 1941 and murdered in Treblinka a year later.

The cemetery is located about 3.5 km southeast of the city centre, in the village of Sulbiny, about 300 metres east of Warszawska Street. On October 17, 1862, representatives from the Synagogue District in Garwolin signed a perpetual lease agreement for a plot of land with dimensions of 15 x 80 bars. The Synagogue District fenced the area with a wall and an embankment ditch, and built a funeral house, a gravedigger’s apartment, and a tool shed. The destruction of the cemetery began during World War II. By order of the Germans, hundreds of tombstones were removed and used to reinforce roads, pavements, yards, and stables. The fence was destroyed, and the area was plowed.

In 1945, the Jewish Committee in Garwolin made efforts to rebuild and protect the cemetery. On July 18, 1945, the Committee signed a contract for the transport of about 160 tombstones (used as the floor in the stable) back to the cemetery. The bodies of people exhumed from graves in nearby towns were also moved to the cemetery. In 1943 eight people previously murdered in Ciechomin were reburied in the cemetery. Another reburial of seven partisans took place in 1948. At the end of the 1980’s, the Garwolin authorities commissioned a monument dedicated to the Holocaust to be built near the cemetery, but the project was never completed. As a result of the degradation of the cemetery, there are currently about 30 tombstones in various conditions, the oldest of which dates to 1868. There is no fence, the cemetery borders are imperceptible, and the area is forested. In recent years, cleaning project have been carried out at the cemetery by people associated with Garwolin.org and scouts from the “Orłów” Unit in Garwolin.
The cemetery is listed in the Provincial Register of Monuments. A partial list of tombstones is available at https://cemetery.jewish.org.pl/list/c_8.

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