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Kiernozia
(District: Lovicz; Province: Warsaw)

Translated by Morris Gradel

No details are available on the origins of the village of Kiernozia (K). It existed as early as the 15th century as part of the estate of the noble family Szarpski. In the 60s of the 19th century it was owned by members of the Lasutski family. K's position astride the road from Lovicz to Plotsk influenced its development. It was a centre of trade and industry for local agriculture, and fixed market days came to be established. In 1784 King Stanislaw August Poniatowski ganted the district governor permission to hold six additional annual fairs. In 1807 the village was incorporated into the Principality of Warsaw, and from 1815 until World War I was part of Congress Poland. During this latter war K was occupied by units of the German army from 1915 until they retreated in 1918.

We have no data available on the beginnings of Jewish settlement in K. Jewish habitation is not mentioned before the early 19th century. The Jews lived from small trade and handicrafts. According to partial statistics from the 1870s Jews owned 8 shops and 11 workshops. In the period between the two world wars Jews were also occupied in the same fields. There was an organised Jewish community in the latter half of the 19th century. A synagogue and religious school existed, but there was no cemetery, and the Jews of K buried their dead in the cemetery at Lowicz. The rabbi of that period was Avraham Noah Neumann. Between the two wars the rabbi was Moshe Bezalel Frankel (who perished in the holocaust). Many of the Jews of K, and the young people in particular, leaned towards Zionism. There was a branch of Beitar with some 40 members.

Jewish children went to the traditional cheder and to the municipal Polish school.

On the outbreak of war in 1939 and the approach of the German army, many Jews left their homes and fled eastwards. On September 16th K was bombed by German planes - the synagogue was destroyed and 20 Jews killed or wounded. The village was occupied two days later. That same day the Jews who had remained in K were rounded up and sent to Zychlin, 17 kms. away. The deportees were kept under open sky and without food the whole night, and then sent to forced labour camps. A few days later these Jews returned to K and found their houses looted.

In March 1940 the Germans set up a ghetto, enclosed by a fence, in two streets inhabited by Poles, who were removed from their houses and the Jews herded into them instead. Each day the Germans took males aged 15 to 60 for forced labour. On July 1st 1940 the Germans pressed into the ghetto some 240 Jews from surrounding villages. In December of that year there were about 650 Jews in the ghetto. In March 1941 the Germans dismantled the ghetto and the Jews of K were sent to the Warsaw ghetto, where they shared the fate of its inhabitants.

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