Korczyna Memorial Book - Translation of Korczyna

This is the translation of the Memorial (Yizkor) Book of Jewish community of Korczyna, Poland.
The cemetery gate symbolizes the separation between the physical and spiritual worlds or hereafter worlds. The gate is more symbolic than real but it tries to delineate the two worlds. Unfortunately in the case of Korczyn the physical world was totally destroyed, and even the spiritual world or the cemetery was badly damaged. Not only were most of the Jews of Korczyn killed far away from their beloved shtetl but all their traces in Korczyn were erased. Hundreds of years of existence were wiped out in a brief moment of history. There is no separation between the physical and the spiritual worlds in Korczyn. The cemetery gate that you see represents both worlds of Jewish Korczyn. It is the symbol that once there was a Jewish community that no longer exists and probably will never exist again in this place.

A great deal of effort, patience and time went into collecting the material about Jewish Korczyn. Most of the survivors faced many daily problems of survival, yet took time out to tell their sad experiences. Their stories revived Jewish Korczyn. As one reads the stories, one can feel the great nostalgia that the authors feel for the little place in Galicia that is no longer. The book written in Yiddish following the war was printed in a limited edition for the members of the of various Korczyner landsmanshaftn. With time the book became a rarity and few libraries possessed it. We therefore decided to translate it into English in order to make it more accessible to the English reading public. We urge you to purchase a copy of the beautiful book for your library, especially if your roots are in Galicia.

This book provides the reader with the rich history of the town, its institutions and people, and the story of its destruction. With the publication of this book, the memory of Jewish community of Korczyna will continue to live for all the descendants of the town.

Alternate names for the town are: Korycin [Polish], Kartchin [Yiddish], Korytsin [Russian], Karitchin