Stalowa Wola - Jews in Rozwadow (a District of Stalowa Wola)

Jews in Rozwadow (a District of Stalowa Wola)

The Rozwadów suburb of Stalowa Wola was a thriving Jewish shtetl prior to World War II and was closely associated with Tarnobrzeg and other nearby shtetls including Ulanów, Mielec, Dzików, etc. These communities, infused with vitality before 1939, were utterly destroyed during the Holocaust after having been affected by World War I only some 20 years earlier. Jews in Rozwadów were a religiously observant community, i.e., Traditional or Orthodox in practice. The leading rabbi of Rozwadów, similar to other rabbis of the region, followed Hasidism practice and was of the Horowitz family. In New York a Rozwadower Rebbe established a small synagogue on the upper West Side which continued for many decades after the War. There is a link to a yizkor book about Rozwadów which gives further notes on the Jewish life there. The Rozwadów synagogue was for the years before World War II, located on Attorney St. in the lower east side of NYC.

During World War II, Dr. Eugene Lazowski, a military doctor of the Polish underground Home Army, Armia Krajowa, created a fake epidemic of dangerous infectious disease, Epidemic Typhus in the town of Rozwadów (now a district of Stalowa Wola) and the surrounding villages and towns. He saved an estimated 8,000 Polish Jews from certain death in Nazi concentration camps during the Holocaust, performing his services in utmost secrecy under the threat of death punishment.

Following the Holocaust, the remaining Jews were motivated to seek a new start in Palestine thanks to Berihah effort. A community of former Rozwadów citizens had been established in New York and continued its affinity long after World War II. Many former Rozwadów citizens of Jewish backgrounds moved to the fledgling State of Israel.