Dov Bar's Volchin - Shmuel's Map -- Northwestern Section

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Dov Bar's Volchin

Shmuel's Map -- Northwestern Section
The north part of the village was populated by Polish goyim with their Catholic church. There was only one Jewish home, of the Moshe BERENZON family, which owned the water mill not far from their home. Since the Soviet liberation of WWII, the Polish Catholics left Volchin and their house of worship was abandoned and is desolated.

Shmuel Englander's Map, redrawn; in English.
North-Western Section: “New/Polish Volchin”
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View Shmuel's Original of this Section

[Added by the editor:] The depiction of the Pulva River and the location of the mill are distorted due to paper size limitation; the actual location was further to the north and west, on a feeder stream, not the Pulva, just south of the Kotera village.

As drawn by Shmuel and Dov, the northwest, outward end of Volchin's main street was marked by a Christian shrine containing a statue. In actuality, the road continued to the northwest, coming to a junction at which a right turn led north to Wysokie Litewskie, about 10km to the north, most probably the most direct path.

The Death Pit and Memorial (Dov's photos here) are beside the road, today in an open space among some industrial or agricultural buildings. At that time, the area has been described as a sand pit outside the town.

The Polish Catholic Church is known as the burial place, from 1938 to 1995, of Stanisław August Poniatowski, the last king of Poland. That church is said to currently (2011) be under reconstruction.

The Palace, barely mentioned on Shmuel's map, represented apparently minimal remains in Shmuel's times of a very extensive French-style chateau constructed during the 18th century by the Poniatowski family. Shmuel referred only to the public garden that used to be there. It was a trysting place for the young men and women of Volchin. Dov says he assumes children played there, too.

Editor's Notes: Christian Shrine: In neighboring Wysokie Litewskie, a roadside shrine existed at the western limit of the town, a predominately Polish area. That shrine still exists. The current condition of the Volchin shrine is unknown.

Page Last Updated: 02-May-2013