Area of the Ghetto

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Kletsk Yizkor Book

Area of the Ghetto

Hebrew and Yiddish versions of Alter Me’irovitz’ article The Partisans Battle (Hebrew title) or Ruin and Revenge (Yiddish Title) describing in words the area of the ghetto NYL original pages, Hebrew section: original pages 162-167 and online image 172 Yiddish section original page 355 and online image 409: [I tend to think that A. Meirovitz wrote it originally in Yiddish]

Compared, researched and checked with 7 eyes… I checked [and corrected!!!] the transliteration of the non-voweled Hebrew names of the streets against:

1. The legend to the hand-drawn [from memory] Yizkor book online image 401

2. The names of the streets as written in Yiddish on the map itself

3. The captions to the photos in the Yizkor book that have street names both in Hebrew and Yiddish.

This was the area of the Kletsk Ghetto:

The area of the ghetto occupied the streets and squares/places /1/ [in Yiddish it could mean sites, places, or squares] as follows: the right side of the Zaranov street to the Zaranov alley. The right side of the alley to Siniavka street. The right side of the Siniavka street to the Jewish street. The right side of the Jewish street to the market square, excluding the market houses /2/ [the Yiddish text says explicitly: not including the market buildings.] to Zaranov Street /3/ Caption of the photo of Zaranov street, online image 192, shows in parenthesis: Sabatsh Street = Sabotage street.] The center of the ghetto was the Synagogues’ square/area /4/ This Yiddish text confirms that this square was in the center of the ghetto. A barbed wire fence, 3 meters high, separated the ghetto from the outer world. The only entrance and exit was next to the שולחן [Yiddish: shulkhn, small synagogue.] /5/ The explanation in parenthesis appears only in the Hebrew version. Spelled the same in Hebrew and Yiddish, שולחן is pronounced in Hebrew shulkhan meaning desk, table and in Yiddish: shulkhn, denoting the reader’s desk in a synagogue. Perhaps this is the reason it became a name for a small prayer house. on the Jewish street.

The tailors used to pray in this small prayer house. We learn this from the caption under the photo online image 196. Here the “nickname” it is spelled and pronounced differently in Yiddish as shulkhl - diminutive of small shul. Hebrew caption:

• The great synagogue and adjacent the שולכל “Shulkhl” (close to the ghetto gate).

Yiddish caption:

• The kalte shul and the Shneider shul (Tailors’ Synagogue) next to the ghetto entrance

In the legend to the map online image 401 the name of this small prayer house is Shneiderseh Kloiz, the tailors’ kloiz (Hassidic prayer house).

#3 is the closest to the border where the “only entrance and exit” was located. In the Yiddish legend to the map it is called Shneidershe kloiz = the tailors’ kloiz [in those days the kloyz was a Hassidic prayer house.] In Alter Meirovitz’ article both in Hebrew and in Yiddish he names it שולחן shulkhn, with no vowel before the 'l'. In the caption to a photo its name is shulkhl and shneidershe shul, tailors’ prayer house.

Yitkhak Halevi Epshtein on page 136 of Yizkor book, online image 146, writes about the Cold Synagogue and says that close by, there was the synagogue of Po’aley Tzedek also called Shulkhn – the place of prayer of the common and working people. (Could there be two shulkhns, shulkhn ending with an N, in two different places?)

Kashetzki, on page 159 of Yizkor book, online image 169 writes [upon breaking from the ghetto after it was set on fire] :

...with an axe in hand I approached the barbed wire fence next to the שולכל [shulkhl]. I run through the Jewish street to the “Vaal” [raised mound of earth] in the direction of the Koliandra estate. [Here the small prayer house near the gate of the ghetto ends with an 'L'.]

Alter Meirovitz p 164 online image 174 refers to this Vaal:

…we reached the Kletsk hill named Kletsker Vaal ...

Shmuel Keizer image 324 p.272 Shul in shtibele = shul shtibl [small prayer house] a warm fore-room to the cold synagogue in article: 4 Roads from Kleck by Aharoni image 325 (with names of streets, etc)

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Page Last Updated: 19-Oct-2018