Dubăsari

Name

The name of the town comes from an old village of Dubăsari (now called Dubăsarii Vechi, literally "old dubăsars") and initially the place was called Dubăsaii Noi, "new dubăsars". The word dubăsari/dubăsarii is the plural form of the archaic Moldavian word dubăsar, "dubasă (coracle) builder" or "boatman".

History

Dubăsari is the site of one of the oldest settlements in Moldova, and the Transnistrian region. Stone Age artifacts have been found in the area, and there are several kurgans (presumed Scythian) around the city. First mentions of modern Dubăsari date to the beginning of the 16th century, as a fair populated by Moldavian peasants. The settlement became part of the Russian Empire in 1792 and was granted city status in 1795. It was part of Kherson Governorate from 1803 to 1922.

The murder of a Ukrainian boy, Mikhail Rybachenko, in Dubăsari became one of the triggers of the Kishinev pogrom after the Bessarabetz paper insinuated that he had been murdered by the Jewish community for the purpose of using their blood in the preparation of matzo for Passover. Unlike in Chișinău (Kishinev), the authorities at Dubăsari acted to prevent the pogrom in the town.

From 1924 to 1940, Dubăsari was part of the Soviet-created Moldavian ASSR. The town was heavily industrialized during the pre-WWII period.

World War II and the Holocaust

In the course of World War II, in 1940, when Bessarabia was occupied by the Soviet Union, Dubăsari became part of the newly created Moldavian SSR.

Before World War II, Dubăsari had a substantial Jewish population. In 1939, 2,198 Jews lived in the town, comprising approximately 49 percent of its population. Following the Axis invasion of the Soviet Union, German and Romanian forces occupied Dubăsari on 24 July 1941. Some of the town's Jews had fled eastward before the occupation, while many Jewish men had been drafted into the Red Army.

After the occupation, Romanian authorities established a ghetto consisting of two streets. Approximately 2,500 Jews from Dubăsari and the surrounding district were confined there. Pavel Tolmachinski was appointed head of the ghetto. Prisoners were required to wear a yellow Star of David and were prohibited from leaving the ghetto, which was guarded by Romanian soldiers.

In late August or early September 1941, a detachment of Einsatzkommando 12, part of Einsatzgruppe D, arrived in Dubăsari under the command of SS-Obersturmführer Max Drexel. Seven execution pits were dug near a former tobacco factory on the northeastern outskirts of the town. On 12 September, the inhabitants of the ghetto were taken to the tobacco factory and then to the pits, where they were shot by Einsatzkommando 12. German personnel carried out the killings with assistance from Romanian authorities and local auxiliary police.

Further mass shootings followed. Around 20 September, approximately 1,000 to 1,500 Jews brought from other localities, including Kotovsk, were murdered at the same site. For approximately another ten days, Jewish prisoners transported to Dubăsari from other districts were also killed there. Einsatzkommando 12 left the town on 28 September 1941.

Dubăsari was subsequently incorporated into the Romanian-administered Transnistria Governorate. The town was recaptured by the Red Army on 12 April 1944.

Moldavian SSR and post-secession

In 1951–1954, the Dubăsari Dam and a 48 MW hydroelectric power plant was constructed, and the Dubăsari Reservoir was formed.

Dubăsari and its suburbs were the sites of major conflict during 1990–1992 that eventually culminated in the War of Transnistria (1992). Since then, it has been controlled by the breakaway administration of Transnistria, and tensions have risen most recently during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The city's economy was significantly damaged during the war in 1992.

Population

In 1989, the population of the city was 35,806, including 15,414 Moldovans (Romanians) (43.05%), 10,718 Ukrainians (29.93%), 8,087 Russians (22.59%), and 1,587 others (4.43%). According to the 2004 Census in Transnistria, the city had 23,650 inhabitants, including 8,954 Moldovans (37.86%), 8,062 Ukrainians (34.09%), 5,891 Russians (24.91%), 153 Belarusians, 104 Bulgarians, 90 Armenians, 49 Poles, 66 Gagauzians, 46 Jews, 39 Germans, 31 Gypsies, and 165 others and non-declared.

Notable natives

Victor Covalenco (born 1975), Moldovan decathlete

Louis Filler (1911–1998), American teacher and scholar

Igor Gorgan (born 1969), Moldovan military officer

Vlad Grecu (born 1959), Moldovan writer

Nikolay Iov (born 1990), Moldovan-Russian powerlifter and musician

Yulia Lisnik (born 1966), retired Moldovan race walker

Anna Odobescu (born 1991), Moldovan singer and actress

Mykhaylo Okhendovsky (born 1973), Ukrainian lawyer

Igor Pugaci (born 1975), retired Moldovan road bicycle racer

Dan Pușcaș (born 2001), Moldovan professional footballer

Pyotr Rachkovsky (1853–1910), chief of the Okhrana, the secret police in the Russian Empire

Nikolay Sklifosovsky (1836–1904), Russian surgeon and physiologist

In fiction

The Sisters of the Winter Wood by Rena Rossner is set in Dubăsari, before and during the 1903 Kishinev pogrom.