In February 2008, my husband and I made a trip
to Rohatyn, the birthplace of my paternal grandmother.
The trip was a culmination of a decade's effort,
on and off, to learn what happened to those she
left behind when she emigrated to NYC with her parents
and sisters in 1911, and to get a picture of what
life had been like in Rohatyn before the War.
While the trip itself was inspired by these personal and family reasons, the main purpose of the following is to assist others who may also go to Rohatyn in the future as we did - without a guide, without speaking the language, and without meeting with local town officials - to more easily find some of the town's current and forgotten sites, including the memorial erected in 1998 to those who were killed in the field on the "outskirts" of town - something we were not able to find on our own while there.
The image below is a composed panorama of the town, taken from near the old wooden Saint Nicholas church (on a hill east of the town square). The view is westward, toward the town square. In addition to the Saint Nicholas church seen in the foreground on the left, you can also see the back of the Roman Catholic church and the steeple of the Ukrainian church (both on the town square) in the left-center of the panorama, and another silver-domed church in the right-center of the view. Click on the image below to see a larger version of the panorama.
The main town square or Rynek is today called Roxolana square, and features
many businesses as well as two of the main driving routes into and out of
the town center. In pictures further below on this page, we have recorded
each of the buildings which face the square, for correlation to information
on other websites. For an more thorough description of the town square's
Ukrainian history and the interesting history of Roxolana, see
Roman Zakharii's excellent Rohatyn information webpage.
The image below is a another composed panorama, this time of the town square. The image starts at the northeast corner of the square, then turns clockwise a complete 360-degree view around the square, ending back at the northeast corner. Toward the left of the panorama, as the view sweeps sothward along the east block of the square, you can see Shevchenko Street and then the large steeple of the Roman Catholic church. The view then sweeps along the south block of the square; I am in the center of the image, with the square's southwest corner behind me. Toward the right of the panorama, the view sweeps northward along the west block of the square, and reaches the Ukrainian church, just off the northwest corner of the square. Finally, the view sweeps eastward along the north block of the square, ending at the northeast corner (behind the tree at the far right of the panorama). You can click on the image below to see and scroll on a larger version of the panorama.
What follows is a set of photos of each building on the modern town square, divided by blocks, and sweeping in the same order as the square panorama above. This also duplicates the sequence posted by Phyllis Kramer on the JewishGen Shtetlinks webpage for the Rohatyn Rynek, from information provided by Jack Glotzer, Herman Skolnick, Howard Steinmetz, and Alexander Walzer, correcting for compass direction. That list of businesses, from before WWII, lists a few businesses once owned by members of my family.
You can click on any of the pictures below to see a larger version.
The east block of the town square is Halitska Street, the primary north-south road through the center of town. In the images below, the first (peach-colored) building is at the northeast corner of the square (actually just off the square, at the corner of Ivan Franko Street); today it is a pharmacy. The images then run in order as we sweep southward along the block. The large green building is on Halitska Street at the corner of Shevchenko Street, which becomes the main eastward road out of town, toward Pukiv, Berezhany, and Ternopil. Across Shevchenko Street (continuing south along the block) is the large Roman Catholic church, and finally a single building which begins a new block on Halitska Street heading south away from the square.
The south block of the square begins at the southeast corner (across Halitska Street from the last building above). Today this is the start of the square; in the first image below, the building with the domed turret on the corner is at #1 Roxolana Square, and the building numbers increase as you travel westward along this block. The block ends with the large white building at the southwest corner.
The west block begins at the southwest corner of the square, with the green-trimmed Nadra bank building; the tannish building at the left of the first image below is a multi-purpose building (market, professional offices, etc.) on a street off the square to the south. Moving northward along the block, there are a number of buildings of various shapes and sizes, ending with the wide cooperative building on the corner of Kotsjubinskogo Street. Across that street is the Ukrainian church (just off the square at the northwest corner).
Referencing again the Ukrainian church just off the northwest corner of the square, the north block of the square begins with the green "Technica" building. Moving eastward along the block, we pass a small alley between the green- and pink-trimmed buildings, and end at what today is a brick building under renovation, at the northeast corner of the square.
My grandmother, Annie (Chaike) Horn, was born in Rohatyn on Purim night 1911 to Izak and Rose Horn, merchants. According to my grandmother, the Horn family had lived in Rohatyn for generations: she was born in the same house in which her father had been born and his father's father had been born. The Horns owned and ran several business on the main Rynek square, including a saloon/restaurant (Jona Horn), a bakery (Dudke Horn), and another saloon (the Fruchter family, married to a Horn daughter). The Liebling family (also married to a Horn daughter) owned a lumber yard in town.
The pictures below are of buildings we believe were owned by the Horns, on and off the Rynek square. To help identify them, we used detailed letters from the late Herman Skolnick, whose family knew the Horns, as well as notes taken from telephone conversations nearly a decade ago with Herman Skolnick and the late Jacob Hornstein, whose sister Bronia was married to David (Dudke?) Horn. This information was then coordinated, to the best of our abilities, with the List of Businesses around the Market Place Before WWII, from the Rohatyn JewishGen Shtetlink website managed by Phyllis Kramer: http://www.shtetlinks.jewishgen.org/rohatyn/RohatynBusiness.htm#RYNEK.
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This large building, on the east block of the square at the corner of Halitska Street (formerly known as Ulica Pitsudskiego) and Shevchenko Street, and across Shevchenko from what is today the Roman Catholic Church, was likely the saloon/restaurant of Jona Horn. According to Herman Skolnick, there originally had been 3 or 4 store fronts at the street level, including, among others, the "well known" Mr. Stein (who had both an office and residence here) and Mr. Pociecha, who had a meat business. |
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This smallish building, second from the north end of the west block of the square, was likely the Fruchter family's saloon/restaurant (married to a Horn daughter). |
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This building has probably been heavily modified since the War. However, its location at the north end of the west block - across from what today is the Ukrainian Church and adjacent to the road that led to the Rohatyn ghetto - makes it the likely building where Dudke and Bronia Horn had a bakery. This building is where Bronia Horn and her daughter(s) hid in the basement during the War, before being discovered; this same basement also later served as a hiding place for Rosette Faust Halpern, per Alex Feller. The building also housed several upper floor apartments, per Herman Skolnick, including Michael Bilan, manager of the Rohatyn electrical plant, per Alex Feller. |
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Road to the left of what is today the Ukrianian Church that led to the Jewish ghetto on which the family Liebling (married to a Horn daughter) owned and operated a lumber yard, per Herman Skolnick. |
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This is a view of Halitska Street, north of Roxolana Square. The view is looking northward, toward the intersection with Fortechna Street. Another family building site is on the south side of Halitska Street, as described in the photos below. |
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This is #91 Halitska Street, on the south face of the street. It is located just south of the intersection with Fortechna. |
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Here is #93 Halitska Street (no number was visible, but it is between #91 and #95). Since both the street name and the numbering system changed since the War, it was difficult to coordinate Herman Skolnick's addresses and descriptions with the buildings as they are today. Currently, this street is called Halitska; previously it was called Pitsudskiego. When it was Pitsudskiego, Chaim Skolnick (father of Herman) had a residence across the street at 8 Pitsudskiego (which today is 82 Halitska). This building (#93) was likely the residence of Dudke Horn, his wife, and their children. Dr. Kleinberg, a Rohatyn jurist, had his residence on the second floor and a front office at street level. |
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Another view of #93 Halitska Street. |
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Here is #95 Halitska Street, just north of #93. |
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This is #82 Halitska Street, across Halitska from #95, and at the corner of Fortechna. This building was likely the residence of Chaim Skolnick and his family (see the notes for #93 Halitska Street above). |
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This is a view westward down Fortechna Street, toward Halitska Street and the former Skolnick house. |
A current street map of Rohatyn is available on the town website at
http://rogatyn.info
(in Cyrillic). The website is interactive, and allows you to find streets
by current name. The map also shows a number of monuments and significant
town features; the modified map at left shows four sites important to Rohatyn
Jewish history (click on the image for a larger version).
See also the 1943 map found and annotated by Donia Gold Schwarzstein, at
http://www.shtetlinks.jewishgen.org/rohatyn/Rohatynmap.htm.
A number of old photos of Rohatyn from around the end of the first world war are available at www.bagnowka.com, a Polish organizer of custom tours in Poland and Ukraine. The photos are copyright Tomek Wisniewski and bagnowka.com; you can see them on the original website by clicking on the thumbnails below.
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| A view of town from near the St. Nicholas church, looking northwest toward the rynek (market square). The Roman catholic church is visible in the center of the image; the Ukrainian church is visible to the left. | The market square, looking east toward the Roman Catholic church. | Another view of the market square, looking southwest. | The Jewish cemetery. |
Click on the images below for larger versions.
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From a letter written to me by Jacob Hornstein - showing photos of his sister Bronia, married to David (Dudke?) Horn, along with their daughters - and his hand-written comments. Identity of the older woman and child in bottom right corner is unknown. |
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Photo with Tonka Horn (middle row, second from the left), photo from Alex Feller. Reproduced on page 159 of the Rohatyn Yizkor Book (Hebrew version). The caption (from the Yizkor English translation) reads: The production of King Lear, December, 1920 - Chaim Drooks, Avraham Tupp, David Prageh, Fishel Weiler, Unknown, Guttwort, Yaakov Foist, Shaul Pancher, Hinde Baum, Tova Baraban, Dr. Leibush Zlaks, Yitzchak Bernstein, Tunke Horen, Reize Leiter, David Rosenstein, Devorah Hoizer. |
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My great-grandmother (Rebecca?) Horn with one of her daughters, likely Tonka Horn. |
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Passport photo of Bronia Hornstein (nee Horn), a Horn daughter who married Jacob Hornstein in order to emigrate to Israel before the rest of the family perished. Jacob Hornstein's sister, also named Bronia, was married to David Horn, owners of the Horn bakery on the Rynek. (Photo provided by Harriet Korim Hornstein Arnoldi). |
In addition to the wealth of information on the JewishGen websites and other links below, I have found these two books to be meaningful to my own research:
Many thanks to Phyllis Kramer, Cipora Blitz, Donia Gold Schwarzstein, and Linda Cantor for their numerous emails that helped to make our visit (and this material) possible. A special thanks to Roman Zakharii for his patience in kindly answering all our emails, and most especially, for the detailed information, maps, and photos he made available to us through his website and his own sources.
A fond and deep thank you to two special Rohatyners who are no longer with us, Herman Skolnick and Jacob Hornstein. Their numerous letters and phone calls in the late 1990s fueled my passion about the town and provided invaluable details about my grandmother's "lost" Rohatyn family.
Lovingly dedicated to my grandmother, Annie Horn.
For corrections or comments, I can be reached at: osborn@nuthatch.org
Kind regards,
Marla Osborn