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The Pinsk massacre was the execution of thirty-five Jewish residents of Pinsk taken as hostages by the Polish Army after it captured the city in April 1919, during the opening phases of the Polish-Soviet War. The local Jews were arrested while holding a meeting. The Polish officer in charge, acting on the suspicion that the meeting was a Bolshevik gathering, ordered the execution of the suspects without trial. His decision was defended by his Polish military superiors, but widely criticized by international public opinion.

Massacre

On April 5th, some seventy-five Jewish civilians were participating in a possibly Zionist meeting; sources vary on whether they had obtained permission to do so from the Polish garrison commander (Major Łuczyński) or whether the meeting was not explicitly authorized. Norman Davies notes that "the nature of the illegal meeting, variously described as a Bolshevik cell, an assembly of the local co-operative society, and a meeting of the Committee for American Relief, was never clarified". The meeting was terminated and its participants were taken prisoner by Polish soldiers, who believed that the Jews were having a meeting in support of the Bolsheviks (at that time the entire region was witnessing the beginning of the Polish-Soviet War and Bolshevik forces were near the city).

A Polish lieutenant, after hearing reports that Jewish inhabitants of the town were preparing to riot, panicked and, instead of carrying out a proper investigation, ordered the execution of the prisoners in order to cow any Bolshevik supporters into submission. Within an hour of the arrest, thirty-five of the detainees were shot by Polish soldiers. Norman Davies notes that "most of the victims were Jewish". The next morning three wounded victims found to be still alive were shot.

Reactions

Polish army

The Polish Group Commander General Antoni Listowski claimed that the gathering was a Bolshevik meeting and that the Jewish population attacked the Polish troops. The overall tension of the military campaign was brought up as a justification for the crime. The Polish military refused to give investigators access to documents, and the officers and soldiers were never punished. Major Łuczyński was not charged for any wrongdoing and was eventually transferred and promoted reaching the rank of colonel (1919) and general (1924) in the Polish army. The events were criticized in the Sejm (Polish parliament), but representatives of the Polish army denied any wrongdoing.

International

In the Western press of the time, the massacre was referred to as the Polish Pogrom at Pinsk, and was noticed by the wider public opinion, resulting in an American mission being sent to Poland to investigate the massacre and other real and alleged atrocities. The American mission, led by Henry Morgenthau, Sr., published the Morgenthau Report on October 3, 1919. According to the findings of this commission, a total of about 300 Jews lost their lives in this and related incidents. The commission also severely criticized the actions of Major Łuczyński and his superiors with regards to handling of the events in Pinsk. However the Morgenthau commission also found out that the Polish military and civil authorities did do their best to prevent the incidents and their recurrence in the future; the excesses were of political (anti-Bolshevik) rather than anti-Semitic nature.

Commemoration

In 1926, kibbutz Gevat (Gvat) was established by emigrants from Pinsk to the British Mandate of Palestine in commemoration of the Pinsk massacre victims.

Notes

1. ^ Bendersky, Jospeh W. (2000). The "Jewish Threat": Anti-semitic Politics of the American Arm. Basic Books. pp. p.84-85. ISBN 0465006183. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)
2. ^ Davies, Norman, White Eagle, Red Star: the Polish-Soviet War, 1919–20, St. Martin's Press, 1972, Page 47-48
3. ^ Davies, Norman (2005). "[[God's Playground]]: A History of Poland". Columbia University Press. pp. p.192. ISBN 0231128193. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help); URL–wikilink conflict (help)
4. ^ Michlic, Joanna Beata (2006). "Poland's Threatening Other: The Image of the Jew from 1880 to the Present". University of Nebraska Press. pp. p.118. ISBN 0803232403. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)
5. ^ Mission of The United States to Poland, Henry Morgenthau, Sr. Report
6. Документы и материалы по истории советско-польских отношений. Т. 2. М., 1963. ("Documents and materials in history of Soviet-Polish relations") LCCN 65-0 С. 105-107. Документы внешней политики СССР ("Documents of the foreign policy of the USSR"), Т. 2. М., 1957-, С. 74—76., ISSN 0485-7127
7. Template:Pl icon Lista starszeństwa generałów polskich w 1939 roku
8. See e.g. David Engel, "Poles, Jews, and Historical Objectivity", Slavic Review, Vol. 46, No. 3/4 (Autumn - Winter, 1987), pp. 568-580
9. ^ Henry Morgenthau (1922). ""Appendix. Report of the Mission of the United States to Poland"". All in a Life-time. Doubleday, Page and Company. Cite error: The named reference "Morgenthau" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
10. Template:En icon Tadeusz Piotrowski (1997). Poland's Holocaust: Ethnic Strife, Collaboration with Occupying Forces and Genocide... McFarland & Company. pp. p. 41-42. ISBN 0-7864-0371-3. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)

• Jewish Polish history
• Polish-Soviet War
• Pogroms
• Prisoners of war massacres