Murder Story of Brześć nad Bugiem Jews in the Area of the Bronna Gora Railway Station

In June 1942 five trains with Soviet civilians arrived...The third train, that consisted of 40 cars with Soviet civilians, arrived from the Brest-Litovsk [sic] station. All the cars were extremely overcrowded. This train contained civilians of Jewish origin. .... The fifth train, that consisted of 13 cars and was overloaded with Soviet civilians, arrived from the Brest-Litovsk station. I learned that in all those 13 cars there were civilians taken from the Brest prison who were Belarusians, Poles, and Jews. The cars of the trains that arrived at the Bronna Góra station were tightly closed. All five trains were switched over to the branch line that led from the central railway station of Bronna Góra to the former military warehouse. About 250-300 meters from the central railway (next to the branch line) six large pits had been prepared, each one about 25-30 meters long, 10-12 meters wide, and 4 meters deep. While the civilians were unloaded from the cars, the bodies of some civilians were thrown from the cars. I suppose that those people had died in the cars only due to their exhaustion and the overcrowding in the cars. While the cars were being unloaded, all the civilians were forced to take off their outer clothing and underwear; in other words, they were naked - the men, the women, and the children. After that, the fingers [of the victims] were examined, and if any rings were found, they were taken away. After this thorough examination, the naked [victims], one after the other, were taken toward the pits and made to descend into a pit by a ladder. In the pit they had to lie face down. When a row was full, shots were fired from sub-machineguns. Then a second and then a third row was laid down until the pit was full. I myself saw all the atrocities and heard the groaning and screaming of the children, the women, and the men. I had the possibility of seeing all this because the switchmen's hut where I was staying and the railway junction were located no more than 250 meters from the pits where the shooting was carried out … And in early October 1942 another train, that consisted of 28 cars with Soviet civilians, arrived. Both the first and the second trains were taken to the branch line, that is, the same location where the cars arriving in June had been unloaded. As I mentioned at the beginning of the investigation, all the civilians were unloaded from the cars, then they were forced to undress and to lie down in the pits one by one, and then shot afterwards. Another train, that arrived in early October 1942, came from the Brest - Litovsk station.