Derazhne

Rivne district, Rivne region

Sources:
- Jewish encyclopedia of Brockhaus & Efron;
- Russian Jewish encyclopedia. Translated from Russian by Eugene Snaider;
- The All South-Western Territory: reference and address book of the Kyiv, Podolsk and Volyn provinces. Printing house L.M. Fish and P.E. Wolfson, 1913;
- Yad Vashem. Derazne
- Nosonovsky M. (2011). "The Karaite Community in Derazne and its Leader Hazzan Joseph ben Yeshu'ah". Eastern European Karaites in the Last Generations: 17–35;
- Shabarovsky V.V. Karaites in Volhynia, in Ukrainian. Lutsk: Tverdynya, 2013

Photo:
- European Jewish Cemeteries Initiative. Derazhne Jewish Cemetery

Rivne region - list of settlements and location of objects

Derazhne, 2024

Derazhne (ukr. Деражне, rus. Деражное), in 16-18 centuries - as part of the Commonwealth. Since 1793 - as part of the Russian Empire. In 19 - beginning. 20th century - the township of Derazho of Rivne district of the Volyn province. In 1919–39 - in the Volyn Voivodeship as part of Poland, in 1939–91 - as part of the Ukrainian SSR.

In 1765, 239 Jews lived in Derazhne,
in 1847 - 352,
in 1865 - 360,
in 1897 - 770 (51.4%),
In 1921 - 624 Jews.

Jews lived in Derazhne from the 17th century. In 1648, the Jewish community suffered greatly from the uprising of Khmelitsky; 12 Jewish houses remained intact.

During the 18th century, the number of Jews in Derazhne increased.
In 1865 there was a synagogue in Derazhne.

In 1913, Jews owned all 36 shops in the township (excluding only 1 shop, where non-Jews traded non-kosher meat).

A Karaite community existed in Derazhne since the late 1500s. In the 17th century, Derazhne was one of the four most important in the Commonwealth Karaite settlements along with Trakay, Lutsk and Halych.

The Karaite community was severely damaged during the Chmielnicki uprising in 1649, and two poems about the destruction were written in Hebrew and in Turkic Karaim language by the leader of the congregation, Hazzan Joseph ben Yesh'uah Ha-Mashbir. Apparently, a small Karaite community survived until the Haidamakas uprising in 1768.


Jewish cemetery in Derazhne, 2019

Derazhne in the 1913 reference book

The Germans occupied the town on July 2, 1941. In the summer and fall of 1941, the German occupying authorities introduced a series of anti-Jewish measures. The Jews of Derazhne were required to wear the Star of David; they were forced to perform hard labor and forbidden to leave the town without permission. The German authorities also decreed the establishment of a Judenrat (Jewish Council).

On October 5, 1941, the Germans set up an unfenced ghetto in Derazhne, and Jews from the town itself and from nearby villages were concentrated there. The total number of inmates was about 1,000.
In May 1942, most of the able-bodied men were sent to forced labor in work camps outside the ghetto, and its remaining population consisted mostly of women, children, and elderly people.

On August 24, 1942, the ghetto was liquidated, and its inmates – the Jews of Derazhne and those of the nearby village of Osowa Wyszka – were shot by an SD unit in an area near Kostopol. Jews from the nearby town of Stepań were also murdered at that site around the same time.
In fall 1942, the Ukrainian police and the German Gendarmerie caught 152 Jews who had been hiding and shot them outside Derazhne, in the Bechalskyi Forest.

In the interwar period, the Jews of Derazhne made their living from trade and petty industry, owning several flour mills and a brick factory.

Most Zionist parties had branches in Derazhne. The town had a Zionist, Hebrew-language Tarbut school and a Jewish public library.

In September 1939, the Red Army entered the town following the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, and Derazhne became part of Soviet Ukraine. Private businesses were nationalized, and all Jewish institutions and organizations were forced to disband.