Haapalah / Aliyah Bet

Гро́дна
Гродно
Hrodna
Grodno
Gardinas
Grodna
Grodnae

Mentioned in 1127, in the Primary Chronicle, as Goroden, the Slavic settlement was located at a crossing of several trading routes,.
Hrodna possibly originated as far as the late 10th century.
The settlement became the capital of a separate principality, ruled by Yaroslav the Wise's grandson and his descendants.

In the 1240-1250s, the Hrodna area, and most of Black Ruthenia, was controlled by princes of Lithuanian origin and formed the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
After the Prussian uprisings a large population of Old Prussians moved to the region.
From 1376 to 1392, Lithuanian Grand Duke Vytautas was the prince of Hrodna, and he stayed there in 1410, during his preparations for the Battle of Grunwald.

From 1413, Hrodna had been the administrative center of a powiat in Trakai Voivodeship.
In 1441, Hrodna received its charter, based on the Magdeburg Law.
After the First Partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, in 1793, Hrodna became the capital of the short-lived Grodno Voivodeship.

In the the Battle of Grodno, September 20–September 22, 1930, the Red Army lost some hundred men and 19 tanks and 4 APCs destroyed or damaged.
The Polish side suffered at least 100 killed in action, military and civil, (Soviet sources claim 644 killed and 1543 captives).
Many more were shot in mass executions.
After the fighting, Polish units were surrounded, anf the remaining units withdrew to Lithuania.
In accordance with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, Hrodna was transferred to the Belarusian SSR, and several thousand of the city's Polish inhabitants were deported to remote areas of the Soviet Union.

On June 23, 1941, Hrodna came under German occupation, which lasted until July, 1944.
The majority of Hrodna's remaining Jews were exterminated in German concentration camps.
In 1942, the Germans renamed the city, Garten (meaning Garden).