Zelów


Zelów is a town in Bełchatów County, Łódź Voivodeship, Poland, with 7,725 inhabitants.

Jews in Zelow

2,000 Jews lived in Zelow before the Second World War. When the Germans arrived in September 1939, they began to rob and terrorize the Jewish population. Some Jews fled the town in 1939, but the Jewish population increased when the Germans resettled hundreds from nearby towns in Zelów. The ghetto population rose to more than 6000 by early 1941. During this early stage of the war, local ethnic Germans were often brutal to the Jews, but some Poles and local Czechs were more sympathetic, even providing some food. Similarly, the German wholesale company Karl Lieb provided food vouchers to the local Jewish population. In what must be a unique occurrence, two Jewish boys played on the Hitler Youth football team, a fact that brought an angry protest from one of their opponents. In spring 1942, ten Jews were publicly hanged with the Jewish population forced to watch. In June, some Jews were sent to the killing camp, Chelmno, where they were immediately gassed. About 100 were sent to the Lodz ghetto. In August 1942, the remaining Jews were rounded up and held in a local factory and church. Some were murdered on the spot, about 150 were sent to the Lodz ghetto, a few tried to hide, and the rest were sent to be murdered at Chelmno.
Only about 40 Zelow Jews survived and found their way back to Zelow after the war. They found one of their synagogues burned and the other used as a storehouse. They soon left.