NEZHIN (NYEZHIN):

By: Herman Rosenthal, S. Janovsky

Russian town, in the government of Chernigov; one of the centers of the tobacco-trade. In 1648 Nezhin was taken by the Cossacks, and its Polish and Jewish inhabitants were put to the sword. On July 20, 1881, an anti-Jewish riot broke out there and continued through July 21 and 22; most of the Jewish houses were destroyed. The military, which was called to suppress the riot, twice used their arms against the mob, killing ten of the rioters. The manufacture of various tobacco-products, which formerly gave employment to many Jews who worked in small shops, is no longer carried on there on account of the new system of collecting tobacco-duties, which favors the concentration of the tobacco industry in the hands of the greater manufacturers. The Jewish artisans number (census of 1898) 980. The Talmud Torah has 98pupils; the three Jewish private schools, 59; and the thirty ḥadarim, about 350. The general schools (boys' and girls' classical gymnasiums, etc.) give instruction to 142 Jewish pupils. The charitable institutions include a dispensary and a biḳḳur ḥolim. Since 1895 the town has had a Jewish loan and savings association. The census of 1897 gives Nezhin a population of 32,108, about one-third of whom are Jews.

H. R. S. J.