Story of the Lehrer family

On January 26, 1909, two Lehrer brothers from Sambor (today's Ukraine) married two Pacanower sisters from Czarny Dunajec on the same day. According to information from the archives in Drohobych, the wedding was performed in Cracow, but Jozef and Ella settled in Czarny Dunajec, while Ephraim and Amalia settled in Drohobych, Bruno Schulz's town near Sambor. The parents of both brothers were Jacob Lehrer of Sambor, who was a baker, and his wife Etel. The sisters' parents were Henryk (Heinrich) Pacanower (1853-1922), a merchant from Czarny Dunajec, and his wife Maria, née Riegelhaupt.

Ella Lehrer, née Pacanower of Czarny Dunajec, photo: USHMM

Jozef Lehrer was an accountant by profession and it is possible that after moving to Czarny Dunajec he helped his father-in-law in business. Henryk Pacanower was a merchant and councilman, and according to one source, he also owned a water mill. We do not know where Pacanower's store was originally located, but it is very possible that his son-in-law Jozef Lehrer took over the business after his father-in-law's death and ran a store in the market in the same place until the war; he also had a wholesale business, which operated under the name "Source of Purchase of Wholesale Goods."

Joseph Lehrer's store on the corner of the market in Czarny Dunajec

The archive has preserved an entry in the book of the dead, in which there is a notation of Henryk Pacanower's death. He died on January 6, 1922 in Czarny Dunajec at the age of 69 from stomach cancer. One of the pre-war postcards shows a large white building on the corner of the market, which housed a store. As residents of Czarny Dunajec recall, local Poles also worked at Lehrer's.

A part of Jozef Lehrer's store on the left

Jozef and Ella had four daughters: Maria (born 12.02.1910 in Czarny Dunajec), Etta (11.06.1911), Regina (8.9.1914) and Irena (14.01.1924 - the 100th anniversary of her birth passed a few days ago). We only have confirmed information about the marriage of the eldest Lehrer daughter. Maria married Michal (Mechel) Weinberger of Jaslo (born 23.02.1906, son of Leib Weinberger and Sarah, née Hass). The wedding took place on April 1, 1928. On January 1, 1929, their son Henryk (Heinrich) was born.

Irena Lehrer from Czarny Dunajec, photo: USHMM

The beginning of the war turned the Lehrer family's life upside down. In the first days of September, they packed up some of their belongings and began to flee, but then returned to Czarny Dunajec. In 1940 they again had to leave their hometown, they were then in Cracow, they lived at 66 Dietla St. They again returned to Czarny Dunajec, where the four of them lived during the war: the parents with their two youngest daughters, Etta had probably married earlier and left for another village, no information about her could be found.

During the war, Jozef worked in his former store only as a salesman; the business was taken over by the occupation authorities and handed over to Tomankova, who ran it until the end of the war. Regina, also known as Reśka, worked as a cleaner at Gestapo headquarters - across the street from the family home.

The deaths of Regina Lehrer and her father Jozef at Gestapo headquarters at the market square during the war is one of the best documented Nazi crimes in Czarny Dunajec. More than a dozen protocols with witness statements describing the killings have survived.

The tragedy occurred on Wednesday, May 20, 1942. "In May, Chraca Karol, possessing meat probably from a heifer, delivered it by horse-drawn wagon to Jozef Lehrer. From Lehrer, some of the delivered meat was carried by another Jew of unknown name, who was stopped at the train station in Czarny Dunajec by border guards. This Jew was supposed to indicate from whom he had purchased the meat, and it is likely that Jozef Lehrer and Karol Chraca were detained on this basis." - wrote the commander of the MO (so called “citizen militia”) in Czarny Dunajec to the District Commission for the Investigation of Nazi Crimes on March 17, 1970.

In a testimony dated April 6, 1970, Stanislaw Glodowski, a postman from Czarny Dunajec, described the crime as follows: "Sometime in May 1942, I noticed one day around 5 a.m. that Karol Chraca [from Wróblówka] came with some package to Lehrer's apartment, and then left the apartment. A short time later, two Gestapo men arrived at Lehrer's apartment. After about an hour, these Gestapo men led Jozef Lehrer out of his apartment, which I saw exactly from the window of my house. As I later learned, the Gestapo men took him to the Sicherheitspolizei building. I learned from Wladyslaw Katana that Jozef Lehrer was shot in the garden of the Sicherheitspolizei building."

Later in his testimony, we read that Lehrer's daughter Reśka and Karol Chraca were shot in the Gestapo building. Glodowski saw the bodies of both of them.

Regina (Reśka) Lehrer was murdered on May 20, 1942 in Czarny Dunajec, photo USHMM.

Reśka, who worked in the building, must have seen either the very moment of her father's death or his body. Seeing this, she threw herself at the Gestapo men, crying and screaming, and was also shot. All three were buried in the Jewish cemetery in Czarny Dunajec The body of Karol Chrac was exhumed in March 1945 and moved to the Catholic cemetery. Ella Lehrer, Jozef's wife, was killed in August 1942 in Czarny Dunajec in executions carried out by the Germans. It is not known what happened to her daughter Irena.

Almost nothing is known about Amalia (Malka), the second daughter of the Pacanowers, who moved to Drohobych. Her husband was Efraim Lehrer, Joseph's brother, who was also an accountant. The archives have preserved information about their two children, who were born in Drohobych. On January 17, 1910, daughter Maria was born; the Lehrers were then living on Liszniańska Street. Two years later, their son Izydor was born (28.06.1912), they indicated Bednarska Street as their address. With both entries there is a note that Malka's mother Maria Pacanower was no longer alive at the time.