Dzisna (; ; ) is a town in
Miory District,
Vitebsk Region, in northern
Belarus
Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus spans an a ...
. It is located on the left bank of the
Daugava River
The Daugava ( ), also known as the Western Dvina or the Väina River, is a large river rising in the Valdai Hills of Russia that flows through Belarus and Latvia into the Gulf of Riga of the Baltic Sea. The Daugava rises close to the source of ...
, near the confluence of the
Dysna
The Dysna (; ) is a river that flows through Lithuania and Belarus into the Daugava River near the town of Dzisna.
The river originates from Lake Parsvėtas, near Dūkštas, Ignalina district municipality. It flows through Lake Dysnai and La ...
. Dzisna is located northwest of
Vitebsk
Vitebsk or Vitsyebsk (, ; , ; ) is a city in northern Belarus. It serves as the administrative center of Vitebsk Region and Vitebsk District, though it is administratively separated from the district. As of 2025, it has 358,927 inhabitants, m ...
. In 2017, its population was 1,500.
s in ''Gebiet'' Glebokie, which was headed by ''Gebietskommissar'' Paul Hachmann. The town was administered as part of the ''
'' arrived in Dzisna and took control of the local police, which then became known as the ''
''. The head of the police in Dzisna was a Pole by the name of Swiniarski, and his deputy was Alfons Bielski. The first ''Aktion'' took place on 28 March 1942, when 30 Jews were shot in what was reportedly a reprisal for the death of the son of the ''Gebietskommissar''. On the night of 14–15 June, a small ''
'' squad, with the help of reinforcements, surrounded the ghetto in Dzisna, which had 2,181 inhabitants according to German records. As they entered the ghetto, some of the Jews resisted, with a few hundred able to flee to the forest, although many were later found by police or turned in. Others who were taken alive were shot in two mass graves near the ghetto. The ghetto was finally liquidated in the summer of 1943. After 1944, Dzisna remained part of the Soviet Union until 1991.