Before World War II, about 12,000 Jews lived in Cherkasy. Before the German occupation of the city in August 1941, part of the Jews managed to leave for other regions of the USSR. Those who, for various reasons, did not do this, fully experienced the inhuman fascist ideology. Almost immediately after the capture of the city, the Germans shot about 300 Jews near the Dnieper, who lived in the Sosnovka area. The Nazis in the early days of the occupation forced all Jews to register and wear distinctive signs in the form of yellow armbands and stars of David on their clothes. All this was done with the aim of controlling and humiliating the Jewish population. Most of the Jews, except for children, were used by the Germans as free labor. The Judenrat was created, which was responsible for the behavior of the Jews and conveyed to them the demands of the occupiers.

In October 1941, the local police created by the Germans issued an order ordering all Jews to move to the ghetto. Two ghettos were organized - Podolskoye and Mytnitskoye. The first was at the corner of the current streets of Gagarina and Zamkovyi Spusk, the second - in the area of ​​the Molotov highway, which is now under the waters of the Kremenchug reservoir. The ghettos were surrounded by barbed wire, leaving them was possible only for work teams. Basically, Jews from the ghetto were used for the most difficult and dirty work, such as cleaning the city, dismantling the rubble of houses, unloading wagons, and the like. The working day lasted at least 12 hours. Indicative of the description of the cruelty of the Germans is the case, which became known thanks to the stories of eyewitnesses. After the retreat of the Red Army, one of the Dnieper islands near Cherkasy was mined. For its clearance, the Germans attracted the prisoners of the Mytnitskoye ghetto. The non-humans forced the Jews to join hands, line up in a chain and walk across the territory of the island. Most of them remained on it, blown up by mines. Now this island is under the water of the Kremenchug reservoir.

Both Cherkasy ghettos were destroyed, according to some sources, in October, according to others - in November 1941. During their elimination, almost all the Jews living in the city perished.

After the liberation of Cherkasy from the Germans in December 1943, a special commission arrived in the city to study the places of mass executions of civilians. However, no data on the results of its work, including those regarding the executions of Jews in the ghetto and beyond it, were ever found.

Therefore, even today there are no unambiguous data on the number of victims, as well as on the date of the liquidation of the ghetto in Cherkasy. Meanwhile, according to some sources, between 8,000 and 12,000 Jews were killed in Cherkassy during the Holocaust. Most of them remained lying in anti-tank ditches and ravines in the vicinity of the city, and quite a few rest at the bottom of the Kremenchug reservoir.