VASHKIVTSI III:  Wiznitzer Family Cemetery Project Report – May 2017

The cemetery entrance is located about 3000 feet west of the town center, on the road to Banyliv and Vyzhnytsya (Wiznitz), at Google maps coordinates
48.390653. 25.506047, on the right (north) side of the road.  It is surrounded by a grey wooden fence.  There is no street sign or gate.  The cemetery can be accessed from an unfenced opening off a dirt road on the east side of the cemetery.  See the last paragraph of this report regarding a mass grave at a separate location.  The present population of Vashkivtsi is 5,430, and there are no known Jewish residents.

Officials/Persons Associated with the Jewish Cemetery:

Mayor of Vashkivtsi: Mykola Perch (050) 560 2513, municipal office in town.

Jewish Representative, Vyzhnytsya Raion: Alexandr Tauscher (097) 729 1119, Wiznitz.

Caretaker: Ivan Kniazkiy (097) 704 5492, lives in house adjacent to cemetery.

Wiznitzer Family Project Coordinator: Mark Wiznitzer 1-571-277-7248 (lives in USA)

Local Rabbi: Menachem Mendel Glitzenstein, Chabad Jewish Community of Chernovtsi, (037) 585 192.

The descendants and family members of four Wiznitzer brothers born in Vashkivtsi (formerly called Waschkoutz am Cheremosh) travelled to Ukraine in October 2010 to clear the Jewish cemetery where their grandmother was buried in 1914.  With the encouragement of then-mayor Mikhailo Sidor and help of local laborers recruited by Alexander Tauscher, the Wiznitzer family cleared the Jewish cemetery of decades of dense vegetation that had made access to most graves inaccessible, and left some trees to convey a park-like setting.  The team photographed and catalogued the graves uncovered, ordered the repair of the perimeter fence, installed a commemorative plaque in English and Ukranian on a boulder provided by the town.  The family also made arrangements for and finances the ongoing semi-annual clearing of vegetation.  The current mayor, Mykola Perch, has been supportive of the project’s continued care for the property.

The Jewish cemetery of Vashkivtsi contains over 845 stones in varying condition, with considerable erosion due to the soft stone, weather and growth of moss.  Many stones are totally or largely illegible.  Most markers have traditional inscriptions and Hebrew names, although many stones include German, Romanian and more recently Cyrillic names and text.  There is widespread use in the older sections of traditional Jewish symbols.  Several stones identify the deceased from other nearby towns.  A couple of stones from the late 20th Century included a crucifix, but at least one of these has been replaced since 2010.  While there may have been some vandalism in the past, most of fallen or tilting stones appear to have been the victim of soft soil conditions and/or tree roots.

The project created a catalogue of graves using alphabetized rows from west to east, and numbered graves from north to south.  The clearing operation uncovered a path in the older section on the Western side, now cut off by the fence and trees, that entered from the main road and originally separated males from females. Since its clearing, the cemetery has been included in at least one organized Jewish heritage tour.  Most visitors are tourists from Israel and other countries. During the clearing operation, a Christian woman from a nearby town came to the cemetery.  She did not know anyone buried there, but regularly visited because the souls there did not have relatives locally to come and pray for them; she considered the cemetery project an answer to her prayers. We also learned that some local townspeople have come to the cemetery over the years to find solace in difficult times.

Visitors are encouraged to come to the cemetery in the early morning, when the lighting and shadows highlight the serene beauty of the place.  The Wiznitzers found the grave of their grandmother Rachel Wiznitzer on the second day of the project’s clearing operation, coinciding with the birthday of their matriarch’s youngest granddaughter.

Vashkivtsi Mass Grave:  A mass grave for some two dozen Jews murdered in 1941 is located to the eastern outskirts of Vashkivtsi, in a dense grove of trees at the intersection of the road leading to the Carpathian foothills and in sight of the Holy Anino Monastery.  There is a stone marker with Hebrew inscription, but the route to the site is unmarked and difficult to find. It is not maintained and surrounded by trash.

The information about the Vashkivtsi Cemetery was submitted to JOWBR. The 2 files in the links below have the information.

Vashkivtsi jowbrsubmission
UKR-07484

Pictures of the headstones (847 pictures) were taken and are provided hereafter. The pictures are numbered (starting from 847 all the way to 1) and correspond to the headstone numbers in the above jowbrsubmission XLS file.

Note: People interested in documentation, the only known record of births and deaths for Vashkivtsi covers 1918-1928 and is located in the federal archives in Chernivtsi.
847   846 

845  844 

843  842 

841  840 

8   7   6  

5  4 

3    2 

1