Justingrad

Justingrad (Russian: Юстинград, also transliterated Yustingrad or Ustingrad), Kiev, Russian Empire (in present-day Ukraine). The Justingrad shtetl was created after Jews were forced out of their homes in the village of Sokolivka (aka Sokolovka, Sokolievka, Sokolowka, Sokoliefka). In 1825, Czar Nicholas I of Russia expelled merchant shopkeepers, specifically non-farmer Jews, from regular villages to villages of their own called shtetlakh (plural of shtetl). Thus, these Jews from Sokolivka moved to the land on the other side of a quarter mile bridge/dam across a lake edge. This shtetl was named Justingrad in honor of Justina, wife of the nobleman who sold the land to the Jews. Many of these Russian Jews left for a better life in the United States around 1900. In August 1919, a pogrom made its way through Justingrad. Jewish men were murdered and Jewish women were defiled. With World War II, on July 27, 1941, the Nazis destroyed Justingrad. Currently, the land of former Justingrad is used as farmland and grazing for livestock from those of neighboring villages.

In 1966, Joseph Gilman traveled to the area, in order to compile documents regarding the Kaprov family from the Sokolivka/Justingrad area. This was published as a book in the US in 1969. In 1966, Justingrad was nonexistent as a village or shtetl; the land was used as a cow pasture. However the Justingrad shtetl sign was still there.

References

Sokolievka/Justingrad : A Century of Struggle and Suffering in a Ukrainian Shtetl, as recounted by Survivors to its Scattered Descendants. By Leo Miller; Diana F Miller; Publisher: New York : Loewenthal Press, 1983. ISBN 0-914382-02-0
The B'nai Khaim in America: A Study of Cultural Change in a Jewish Group. By Joseph Gillman; Publisher: Dorrance,1969. ISBN 0-8059-1315-7

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Coordinates: 49°54′55″N 30°13′38″E / 49.91528°N 30.22722°E / 49.91528; 30.22722