Sosnowiec Ghetto Sosnowiec Ghetto or Sosnowitz Ghetto was a ghetto established for Jews by Nazi German authorities in the Province of Upper Silesia in occupied Poland during the Holocaust . History . Before the war , there were about 30 , 000 Jews in Sosnowiec , making up about 20 % of the town ' s population . Over the next few years Germans would resettle Jews from smaller local communities to Sosnowiec , temporarily increasing the Jewish community size to 45 , 000 . By late 1942 , Będzin and nearby Sosnowiec , which bordered Będzin , became the only two towns in the Zagłębie Dąbrowskie region that were still inhabited by Jews . The city , located on the pre - war Polish - German border , was taken over by Germans within the first days of the invasion of Poland . Local Jews were rounded up and terrorized immediately ; shootings and first mass executions followed soon afterward , and forced relocations , slowly creating a ghetto . On September 9 , the Great Synagogue in Sosnowiec was burned . Judenrat and Jewish police were soon established ; the head of the Sosnowiec Judenrat was ( Mojżesz Merin ) . In the first months of 1940 the " Zentrale der Judischen Altestenrate in Oberschlesien " ( Central Office of the Jewish Councils of Elders in Upper Silesia ) , headed by Merin , was created in Sosnowiec , representing about 45 communities . For a time , Merin became infamous as the dictator of the Jews of the Zaglebie region , with the power of life and death over local Jews . A local labor camp was established , along with various workshops , overseen by Germans ( see Forced labor in Germany during World War II ) . Ever since the ghetto was established , there had been a steady trickle of Jews sent to labor and extermination camps . Large transfers of Jews took part in May ( 1 , 500 ) and June 1942 ( 2 , 000 ) . Around October 1942 - January 1943 the ghetto was moved to the district . Środula also bordered the site of the Będzin Ghetto . At this point about 13 , 000 Jews still lived in Sosnowiec . The creation of the Sosnowiec ghetto ended on March 10 , 1943 , when it was finally closed off from the outside world . Thousands of Jews were deported from Sosnowiec ghetto to Auschwitz in June 1943 . The Ghetto was liquidated two months later , in August , and almost all remaining Jews were also deported to Auschwitz . A few hundred Jews remained in the Środula ghetto , which was liquidated in January 1944 . Uprising . There had been considerable underground activity among the Jews in Sosnowiec Ghetto , mostly organized by the youth organizations Ha - No ' ar ha - Ziyyoni , Gordonia , and Ha - Shomer ha - Za ' ir . During the final major deportation push in August 1943 , the Jewish Combat Organization ( ŻOB ) in Będzin and Sosnowiec staged an uprising against the Germans . The uprising , a final act of defiance of the local population , was unsuccessful ; most of the Jewish fighters perished fighting the overwhelming German forces . Resistance of the ghetto inhabitants is commemorated by one of the streets in Sosnowiec , bearing the name " Street of the Ghetto Heroes " ( Ul . Bohaterów Getta ) . In popular culture . Sosnowiec Ghetto is the setting of the " Maus " comic by Art Spiegelman .