Bershad
City in Vinnytsia Oblast, Ukraine
title: "Bershad" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["bershad", "cities-in-vinnytsia-oblast", "cities-of-district-significance-in-ukraine", "populated-places-established-in-the-1450s", "olgopolsky-uyezd", "holocaust-locations-in-ukraine", "15th-century-establishments-in-ukraine", "1459-establishments-in-europe"] description: "City in Vinnytsia Oblast, Ukraine" topic_path: "geography" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bershad" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0
::summary City in Vinnytsia Oblast, Ukraine ::
::data[format=table title="Infobox settlement"]
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| official_name | Bershad |
| native_name | Бершадь |
| native_name_lang | uk |
| settlement_type | City |
| image_skyline | 1866233 original Bershad.jpg |
| image_caption | Moszyński Chapel |
| image_flag | Bershad flag.svg |
| image_shield | Bershad coat of arms (UHT).svg |
| pushpin_map | Ukraine Vinnytsia Oblast#Ukraine |
| coordinates | |
| subdivision_type | Country |
| subdivision_name | |
| subdivision_type2 | Raion |
| subdivision_name2 | Haisyn Raion |
| subdivision_type3 | Hromada |
| subdivision_name3 | Bershad urban hromada |
| leader_title | Mayor |
| established_title | Founded |
| established_title2 | Magdeburg rights |
| established_title3 | City status |
| population_as_of | 2024 |
| population_total | 11742 |
| population_footnotes | |
| population_density_km2 | auto |
| timezone | EET |
| utc_offset | +2 |
| timezone_DST | EEST |
| utc_offset_DST | +3 |
| postal_code_type | Postal code |
| subdivision_type1 | Oblast |
| subdivision_name1 | Vinnytsia Oblast |
| :: |
| official_name = Bershad | native_name = Бершадь | native_name_lang = uk | settlement_type = City | image_skyline = 1866233 original Bershad.jpg | image_caption = Moszyński Chapel | image_flag = Bershad flag.svg | image_shield = Bershad coat of arms (UHT).svg | shield_size = | pushpin_map = Ukraine Vinnytsia Oblast#Ukraine | coordinates = | mapsize = | map_caption = | subdivision_type = Country | subdivision_name = | subdivision_type2 = Raion | subdivision_name2 = Haisyn Raion | subdivision_type3 = Hromada | subdivision_name3 = Bershad urban hromada | leader_title = Mayor | leader_name = | established_title = Founded | established_date = | established_title2 = Magdeburg rights | established_date2 = | established_title3 = City status | established_date3 = | area_total_km2 = | population_as_of = 2024 | population_total = 11742 | population_footnotes = | population_density_km2 = auto | population_demonym = | timezone = EET | utc_offset = +2 | timezone_DST = EEST | utc_offset_DST = +3 | elevation_m = | postal_code_type = Postal code | postal_code = | area_code = | website = | blank_name = | blank_info = | subdivision_type1 = Oblast | subdivision_name1 = Vinnytsia Oblast Bershad (, ; ) is a city in Vinnytsia Oblast, Ukraine, located in the historic region of Podolia. Until 2020 it was the administrative center of the former Bershad Raion.
History
::quote
::
|title=Historical affiliations |fontsize=85% |quote=Alex K Grundwald flags 1410-03.svg Grand Duchy of Lithuania 1459–1569 Chorągiew królewska króla Zygmunta III Wazy.svg Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth 1569–1672 Ottoman Empire 1672–1699 Royal Banner of Stanisław II of Poland.svg Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth 1699–1793 Russian Empire 1793–1917 Flag of Ukraine (1917–1921).svg Ukrainian People's Republic 1917–1918, 1918–1920 Flag of Ukraine (1917–1921).svg Ukrainian State 1918 Flag of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic (1919–1929).svg Soviet Ukraine 1920–1922 Soviet Union 1922–1941 Kingdom of Romania 1941–1944 Soviet Union 1944–1991 Ukraine 1991–present |[[File:Bereszada.jpg|thumb|Former Moszyński Palace in Bershad]]}} The first extant mention of Bershad appears in 1459. It was a private town of Poland, owned by the families of Zbaraski and Moszyński. Polish nobleman Piotr Stanisław Moszyński built a palace complex in Bershad. The only remaining parts of the complex are the park and the chapel of the Moszyński and Jurjewicz families.
In 1648, during the Khmelnytsky Uprising under the Cossacks, Maksym Kryvonis conquered Bershad and slew many of the Catholics and Jews there. Before World War II, the city had an important Jewish community. Bershad was famous in the middle of the nineteenth century for its Jewish weavers of the tallit, a ritual shawl worn by Jews at prayer. By the end of the century, the demand decreased, and the industry declined, leading many weavers to emigrate to America. In 1900 the Jewish population of Bershad was 4,500, out of a total population of 7,000. The Jewish artisans numbered about 500. The community possessed synagogues and several houses of prayer. One synagogue survived World War II and was not closed during Soviet times. It is still active. Many Jews worldwide bear a "Bershidsky/Bershadsky" surname referring to the town.
During World War II, Romanian forces allied with the Nazi Germans transformed the Bershad area into a ghetto as part of the Romanian-occupied Transnistria Governorate. Many of the ghetto victims were Jews brought in from Bessarabia. Thousands of Jews were starved to death or died because of typhus in the ghetto during the Holocaust, including the writer and poet Mordechai Goldenberg. According to the Yad Vashem database, the number of Jews who died in Bershad whose names are available, including the deportees, who died in the Holocaust was 6,060.
Sports
Bershad is home to the football club FC Nyva Bershad.
Notable people
- Yury Kovalenko (1977–2014), a Ukrainian military leader, Hero of Ukraine
- Anatoliy Matviyenko (1953–2020), a Ukrainian politician
- Witold Pruszkowski (1846–1896), a Polish painter, was born in Bershad
- Roman Shvartsman (born 1936), a chairman of the Odessa regional Association of Jews – former prisoners of ghetto and Nazi concentration camps
- Nadezhda Ulanovskaya (1903–1986), a Soviet intelligence GRU officer
References
References
- https://sss-ua.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Bershadska-TH_sotspasport_1ch._druk.pdf {{Bare URL PDF. (August 2025)
- "המכון הבין-לאומי לחקר השואה - יד ושם".
- "History of Jews in Bukowina [Volume II, pages 73-74]".
- Kessler, Arthur. (2024). "A Doctor's Memoir of the Romanian Holocaust: Survival in Lager Vapniarka and the Ghettos of Transnistria". University of Rochester Press.
- Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Center (in Israel), at https://collections.yadvashem.org/en/names/search-results?page=1&s_place_death_search_en=Bershad&t_place_death_search_en=yvSynonym
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