Siedlce (Polish pronunciation: ['ɕɛdlt͡sɛ] ⓘ) (Yiddish: שעדליץ Shedlits) is a city in eastern Poland with 77,354 inhabitants (as of 2021[update]).

The city is situated between two small rivers, the Muchawka and the Helenka, and lies along the European route E30, around 90 kilometres (56 mi) east of Warsaw.

The city, which is a part of the historical province of Lesser Poland, was most probably founded some time before the 15th century, and was first mentioned as Siedlecz in a document issued in 1448.

In 1692 Siedlce burned again, and the destruction was used by Kazimierz Czartoryski, the son of Michał Jerzy, to plan a new, modern market square, together with adjacent streets.

The Ogiński Palace was visited by several notable artists and writers, such as Franciszek Karpiński, and Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz.

Following his defeat, during the creation of the Russian-controlled Congress Poland (1815), Siedlce became the seat of a province in the Russian Partition (see Podlasie Governorate).

Siedlce continued to develop with new administration buildings, a post office complex, a courthouse, and a new prison.

In the late 19th century, Siedlce became an important railroad junction, with connections to Warsaw (completed 1866), Brest Litovsk (1867), Małkinia Górna (1884), and Czeremcha (1906).

Due to German terror, the town lost one-third of its population, including its entire Jewish community deported to extermination camps during the Holocaust.

The Germans operated the Stalag 366 prisoner-of-war camp for Polish, Italian, French and Soviet POWs in the city with subcamps in Suchożebry and Biała Podlaska.

In 1794, a Beit Midrash (study hall) was founded in the town and 1798 the Jewish cemetery was extended, testifying to the increase of the community.

Until 1819, the Jewish community of Warsaw, 90 kilometres (56 miles) to the west, was formally subject to the authority of the Siedlce rabbis.

Their number remained steady in the interwar period, and in 1939, on the eve of the Second World War, there were some 15,000 Jews living in the town.

[citation needed] In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, secular political and cultural activity was evident among Jews in Siedlce, similar to other parts of Central and Eastern Europe.

In the last decades of Tsarist rule, many Siedlce activists (both Polish and Jewish) took part in the 1905 Revolution.

In March 1941, – still before the formal decision to implement the "Final Solution" which meant the wholesale extermination of the Jews – German Order Police battalions rampaged for three days in Siedlce, killing many of its Jewish inhabitants.

Survivors of the town's population established an association in Israel which in 1956 published a comprehensive memorial book on the community's history.

[17] In 1971, Y. Kravitz, one of the survivors, published his memoirs entitled "Five Years of Living Hell under Nazi Rule in the City of Siedlce".