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Ushomyr Jewish Cemetery

Cemetery Information

Country
Ukraine
Region
Zhytomyr
District
Korosten
Settlement
Ushomyr
Site address
The cemetery is located opposite No.26 Kyivs’ka Street. Follow the dirt road for 290m and then the cemetery is on the right in the wood (opposite the Orthodox cemetery).
GPS coordinates
50.86504, 28.48126
Perimeter length
530 мetres
Is the cemetery demolished
no
Type and height of existing fence
The cemetery is not fenced, in places you can see a moat.
Preservation condition
Unfenced Jewish cemetery
General site condition
The cemetery is located in woodland. It is covered with fallen leaves and it is partly overgrown with bushes & trees. Memorial to the victims of the Shoah. The cemetery is very overgrown with trees and bushes, due to this many gravestones are already ruined. Last burial was in 1998. The older part of the cemetery is destroyed; there are also monuments with fences.
Number of existing gravestones
About 100. There are several matzevot with barely legible inscriptions that can be dated to an earlier period.
Date of oldest tombstone
1919 (the earliest tombstone found by ESJF).
Date of newest tombstone
1998 (the latest tombstone found by ESJF).
Urgency of erecting a fence
High
Land ownership
Municipality
Preserved construction on site
No
Drone surveys
No

Historical overview

The exact period of the cemetery’s establishment is unknown. But it emerged no later than the early 20th century, as the earliest tombstone dates to 1919. It is also marked on a map from the 1900’s. The cemetery was used by the Jews of Tcholivka. It was restored in the 1970’s.

Jews in Ushomyr (Ukr., Rus. Ушомир, Yid. אישאָמער) are first mentioned in 1750. The community maintained a synagogue and a prayer house as of 1885. The Jewish population stood at 1,129, which was 78% of the total, in 1897. During the Civil War of 1918–21, the community suffered from pogroms and looting. There were 1,749 Jews in Ushomyr in 1926. After the German invasion of the USSR in 1941, some of Ushomyr’s Jews were able to flee. The majority of the remaining Jews were murdered. Four Jewish youngsters burned 48 houses in retaliation.
It is not known when the cemetery was founded. It is marked on maps from around 1900. According to the 1994–95 survey of the Jewish Preservation Committee (KSEN), the oldest identifiable date on a tombstone was 1919. The monument marks the mass grave of Holocaust victims.

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