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Murder Story of Mogilev Jews at the Jewish cemetery
Murder Site
Meshenkovskoye(Mogilev)
Belorussia (USSR)
On October 2, 1941 members of the 322nd Order Police Battalion of Einsatzkommando 8b; of the staff of the Supreme Chief of Security Police and SD "Central Russia" and Ukrainian policemen operating at the time in Belarus, surrounded the ghetto of Mogilev. More than 2,000 Jews of all ages and both sexes were driven out of their houses. Those who did not move fast enough were severely beaten by Germans and Ukrainians. 65 Jews were shot on the spot, the rest were taken to the Dimitrov factory on the western outskirts of the city, where they were held overnight. The next morning the Jews were loaded in groups onto trucks and driven to the anti-tank ditches that had been dug at the Jewish cemetery, situated between the villages of Kazimirovka and Novo-Pashkovo, 12 kilometers northwest of Mogilev. There the victims were ordered to lie face down and then were shot by members of the 1st and 3rd Companies of the 322nd German Order Police Battalion (which were later reorganized as the 7th and 9th Companies of the 3rd Order Police Battalion of Police Regiment "Center") and by Ukrainian auxiliaries. The latter mainly shot the children, including infants; some of the children were thrown into the ditches alive. This terrible brutality disgusted even some of the German killers. According to the diary of the 322nd Police Battalion, 2,008 (according to another page of the diary - 2,208) Jews were killed in this mass murder.
Related Resources
Written Testimonies
German Reports / Romanian Reports
Lyubov Naymark from Mogilev testified:
... In the autumn of 1941, when it was already very cold outside, Germans came into the ghetto in several trucks covered by tarpaulins. They started to drive the Jews out of their houses and to load them onto the trucks. The sounds of screams and weeping were heard in the ghetto. Those unable to walk were shot on the spot. I saw this with my own eyes.
The Germans took away all the Jews; at the time I did not know where. Only later did I understand that it was to kill us. The group I was in, however, was taken to the camp located on the territory of the Dimitrov factory, where the "Strommashina" plant is today. At the camp I approached a German and told him that I was Russian [although she was, in fact, Jewish] but my husband was a Jew. He let me go, together with my daughter. That was about the next morning. In the camp my daughter saw some men, including my husband, sitting in a room, where Germans were beating them on the head with sticks....
Alexander Litin and Ida Shenderovich, eds., History of Mogilev Jewry, Mogilev, 2009, book 2, pp. 159-160 (Russian).
Valentina Belkovskaya, who was born in Mogilev in 1928 and lived in the city during World War II, testified:
... One day, early in the morning (at dawn) we were awakened by loud cries, screaming, the crying of children, and the barking of dogs. We were far from Dubrovenka [the area where the ghetto was located], but the noises were so loud that we could hear them well. It was so terrible that it is impossible to describe it. It was said that all the Jews were driven out of their houses and loaded into covered trucks. They were forbidden to take their belongings. Those unable to walk were shot in their houses, in their beds....
Afterwards the [local] policemen searched the houses, collecting the abandoned goods, which were then sold in special shops. People said that the rings, earrings, and other jewelry were taken by Germans. We children went the next day toward evening to see what was left there. It was a horrible sight: there were empty, abandoned houses and hungry dogs. In one of the houses we saw the dead body of an old man in his bed and we ran out with cries of terror....
Alexander Litin and Ida Shenderovich, eds., History of Mogilev Jewry, Mogilev, 2009, book 2, pp. 163-164 (Russian).
Meshenkovskoye(Mogilev)
Jewish cemetery
Murder Site
Belorussia (USSR)
53.914;30.342