Boryslav

Coordinates: 49°17′21″N 23°25′08″E / 49.28917°N 23.41889°E / 49.28917; 23.41889
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
For the village in central Poland, see Borysław, Łódź Voivodeship. For the small city in southern Ukraine, see Beryslav.
Boryslav
Борислав
City
Oblast
Lviv Oblast
RaionDrohobych Raion
HromadaBoryslav urban hromada
First mentioned1387
Government
 • MayorIhor Yavorskyi
Area
 • Total37.0 km2 (14.3 sq mi)
Population
 (2022)
 • Total32,473
Websitewww.boryslavmvk.gov.ua
Map

Boryslav (Ukrainian: Борислав; Polish: Borysław) is a city located on the Tysmenytsia (a tributary of the Dniester), in Drohobych Raion, Lviv Oblast (region) of western Ukraine. It hosts the administration of Boryslav urban hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine.[1] Boryslav is a major center of the petroleum and ozokerite industries.[2] Population: 32,473 (2022 estimate).[3]

History

Bronze age

The area of the modern town of Boryslav has been inhabited at least since the Bronze Age. There are remnants of a pagan shrine from the 1st millennium BC located in the area, where approximately 270 petroglyphs are found, mostly depicting solar signs – symbols of a pre-Christian Solar deity.

Development of the community

Historical affiliations

Kingdom of Poland 1387–1569
Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth 1569–1772
Habsburg monarchy 1772–1804
 Austrian Empire 1804–1918
West Ukrainian People's Republic 1918-1919
 Second Polish Republic 1919–1945
 

Ukrainian SSR) 1939–1941 (occupation
)
 Nazi Germany 1941–1944 (occupation)
 
Ukrainian SSR
) 1944–1991
 Ukraine 1991–present

Between the 9th and 13th centuries, the site of the modern town housed a

Halych-Volhynian Principality
.

With the collapse of the latter, in 1387 Boryslav became a part of the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland.[2] In 1772, during the Partitions of Poland, it was annexed by Austria and became a part of the Austrian Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria.[2]

Oil and ozokerite production

Oil wells in Borysław

One of the great technological developments of the 19th century was the discovery by pharmacists

mineral wax, mined in Borysław, was used for insulation of the first trans-Atlantic telegraphic cable line. On 31 December 1872, a railway line linking Borysław with the nearby city of Drohobycz (now Drohobych, Ukraine) was opened. In 1909, more than 1,920,000 tonnes of oil were produced in the region — roughly 5% of the world's oil production at that time making the region the third biggest producer of oil after the US and the Russian Empire in the world.[5]

Poland

Historical population
YearPop.±%
192116,099—    
193141,683+158.9%
202232,473−22.1%
Source: [6]

After the

Polish-Ukrainian War of November 1918 – July 1919 the area became part of the newly reborn Poland. In 1920 the mining school was significantly expanded and was renamed to Carpathian Geological Station, a de facto oil mining university. As the capital of the Zagłębie Borysławskie (Borysław Oil Basin), the town of Borysław was the centre of then Polish oil and ozokerite extraction industries and one of the most important industrial zones of Poland.[5] Because of that, on 26 July 1933 the town was granted a city charter. Together with the nearby settlement of Tustanowice (Tustanovychi, now part of Boryslav), Boryslaw produced in 1925 about 80% of Polish oil (812,000 tons). Boryslav was then commonly called the "Polish Baku". In the period 1929–1936, oil extraction shrank from 511,000 to 319,000 tonnes of oil annually.[5]

World War II

In 1939, it was allocated to the

Ukrainian SSR[2] after the Soviet invasion of Poland, the town was annexed by the Soviet Union under the terms of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. It was renamed Boryslav. In 1941, the city fell under German control upon the advances of the German army to the east at the start of Soviet–German hostilities
.

Jewish casualties

About 13,000 Jewish residents lived in Boryslav at the beginning of the war. On the day following the Germans' arrival, local Ukrainians launched a pogrom, participated in by some German soldiers, that murdered approximately 350 Jews and wounded and robbed many more. The first official anti-Jewish actions began at the end of November 1941, when around 1,500 Jews, the majority of whom were deemed weak and unable to work, were shot by the Ukrainian militia and German security police in the forest near the town of Truskavets. During the winter of 1941–1942, many Jews died of hunger and disease, including typhus. In May 1942, an official ghetto was established; some Jews from neighboring towns were brought there to live. At the beginning of August 1942, Jews, including those from neighboring villages, like Pidbuzh and Skhidnytsya, were rounded up by the German police, Ukrainian Auxiliary Police, and Jewish police. Some were shot on the spot, about 400 were sent to the Janowska labor camp near Lwów, and 5000 were sent to Belzec where they were immediately gassed.

Two separate ghettos were created in Boryslav, including one for workers in the oil industry. In October 1942, the German and local Ukrainians and Poles, led by German soldiers, rounded up more than 1000 Jews and sent them to Belzec to be murdered. In another action in November, about 1500 Jews were rounded up, held for three weeks under depraved conditions in a local cinema, and then sent to Belzec.

During the fifth action in February 1943, 600 Jews were shot by members of the

Plaszów and Mauthausen) from April to June 1944. In all, over 10,000 Jews native to Boryslaw were shot by Germans and Ukrainians or murdered in the camps.[7]

Jewish lives saved

Some Jews escaped and formed partisan units in the forests. Resistance groups in the ghetto obtained some arms and set fire to some raw materials in ghetto industry.

World War II German post stamp

The manager of the German Karpathen oil company,

Righteous among the Nations by Yad Vashem.[8]

For a description of the activities in Boryslav during the war, see the

Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos.[9] A personal-account history of this period is recounted by the Polish-American writer — and Boryslav native — Wilhelm Dichter
in his popular and acclaimed literary debut, Koń Pana Boga. It is a memoir of the war in Borsylav as Dichter experienced it as a Polish-Jewish child.

After World War II

Following Germany's defeat in World War II, the town came again under Soviet rule. Since 1991, the town has been part of an independent Ukraine. The oil industry remains operating.[5] Experts believe that potential oil fields around Boryslav contain far more stocks.[5]

Until 18 July 2020, Boryslav was designated as a

Boryslav Municipality. As part of the administrative reform of Ukraine, which reduced the number of raions of Lviv Oblast to seven, Boryslav Municipality was merged into Drohobych Raion.[10][11]

Landmarks and visitor attractions

International relations

See also: List of twin towns and sister cities in Ukraine

Twin town – sister city

Boryslav is

twinned
with:

Notable people

Mykhailo Dragan
  • Hank Brodt (1925-2020), Holocaust survivor and author of Hank Brodt Holocaust Memoirs. A Candle and a Promise [Amsterdam Publishers, 2016]
  • Johan (Jan) Zeh (1817–1897), pharmacist, discovery of technology that led to the establishment of a new industry based on petroleum. Scientists worked out a method of distilling Boryslaw crude oil, and on 30 March 1853 constructed the first kerosine lamp
  • Mykhailo Dragan (1899–1952), Ukrainian art historian, born in Tustanovychi
  • José Maurer (1906-1968), stage and cinema actor starring mainly in the Yiddish theatre in Europe, Argentina and Israel
  • Zbigniew Balik (born 1935), Polish scientist and politician, deputy to the Sejm 1989–1991.
  • Wilhelm Dichter (born 1935), engineer, Holocaust survivor and writer
  • Wladyslaw Nehrebecki (1923–1978), a Polish animator and cartoon director, creator of Bolek and Lolek
  • Michael Sobell (1892–1993), British businessman and philanthropist
  • Shevah Weiss
    (1935–2023), Israeli politician
  • Vira Vovk (1926–2022), Ukrainian poet
  • Academy of Fine Arts
    in Kraków

Gallery

  • Oil pumps in the Boryslav city park, 2009
    Oil pumps in the Boryslav city park, 2009
  • Coat of arms in 1996–2012
    Coat of arms in 1996–2012
  • The bell tower of the Church of St. Anna
    The bell tower of the Church of St. Anna
  • Assumption Church
    Assumption Church
  • Polish-built Palace of Culture for Oilers, 2009
    Polish-built Palace of Culture for Oilers, 2009
  • Bust of Adam Mickiewicz
    Bust of Adam Mickiewicz
  • City administration building, 2006
    City administration building, 2006
  • Visit of Francis Joseph I to Boryslav by Wojciech Grabowski, 1880
    Visit of Francis Joseph I to Boryslav by Wojciech Grabowski, 1880

See also

References

  1. ^ "Бориславская городская громада" (in Russian). Портал об'єднаних громад України.
  2. ^ a b c d Bridgwater, W.; Kurtz, S. (1963). The Columbia encyclopedia. Third edition.
  3. ^ Чисельність наявного населення України на 1 січня 2022 [Number of Present Population of Ukraine, as of January 1, 2022] (PDF) (in Ukrainian and English). Kyiv: State Statistics Service of Ukraine. Archived (PDF) from the original on 4 July 2022.
  4. ISBN 0-674-01887-7
    .
  5. ^ a b c d e Oil extraction of the early 1910s in Boryslav, Western Ukraine (photographs of Boryslav from the 1910-1930s), The Ukrainian Week (16 April 2018)
  6. ^ Wiadomości Statystyczne Głównego Urzędu Statystycznego (in Polish). Vol. X. Warszawa: Główny Urząd Statystyczny. 1932. p. 138.
  7. ^ a b "Yahad - in Unum".
  8. ^
    ISBN 978-1-4408-4084-5
    .
  9. ISBN 978-0-253-35599-7
    .
  10. ^ "Про утворення та ліквідацію районів. Постанова Верховної Ради України № 807-ІХ". Голос України (in Ukrainian). 2020-07-18. Retrieved 2020-10-03.
  11. ^ "Нові райони: карти + склад" (in Ukrainian). Міністерство розвитку громад та територій України.

External links

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