KARTUZ-BEREZA 1993 YZKOR
DESTRUCTION
OF THE TOWN
Murder
of Jews in Brona Gura
VASILY
GROSSMAN and ELYIA ERENBURG, were outstanding Russian Jewish writers. During
the communist period, they wrote and edited the "Black Book", which
described the horrors perpetrated by the Germans (who, in the language of the
communist system, were called Fascists), during the WWII. The book was translated to Hebrew and
published by the Editorial Am Oved, in 1991.
The
following is from the Brest Chapter in the Black Book (pages 179/186 in the
Hebrew translation), which describes the end of the Jews of Brest in the
forests of Brona Gura together with people from
different towns, including Kartus Bereza.
The
preparations to carry out the liquidation and the way in which should it should
be done, is written in an official document edited after the murders by a
Council composed of representatives of the Soviet authorities, the partisans
and inhabitants of the area of Brest. The Council was designated by: President:
Archady Ivanovich Tarasavich. Its members included the President of the
Council of the area of Berezov, Vassily
Nicholayevich Buri; the
representative of the partisans, Iván Parvlovich Kashtalian; and the
representative of the area of Berezov, the comrade
Ch. Novick.
A
memorandum was prepared by the Council about the cruelties, the assaults, the
sufferings and the destruction that the Fascist conquerors perpetrated in the
forests of Brona Gura near Bereza. Is says, “after
reviewing the territory where Soviet citizens were tortured and shot by the
Fascist Germans, and through investigations carried out by other citizens on
this matter, we reach the following conclusion”.
According
to the plans prepared and carried out by Fascist conquerors in the forests of
Brona Gura, between May and June of 1942 they dug
graves on 16.800 (square) meters of land at a distance of 400 meters NE of the
railroad station at Brona Gura.
Germans
used peasants of the area to do this work, between 600 and 800 people daily. To
speed up the work they used different explosive materials. By the middle of
June of 1942, after digging the graves, Germans began to transfer Soviet
citizens from different places in railroad boxcars to the Brona Gura station.
Citizens were also transferred from fields in Bereza, Brest, Dohitzin, Yanov, Horodetz and other places in Belarus. Some citizens were
transferred on foot to the area of Brona Gura. The
boxcars were overloaded and there were many who died in transit. When they
arrived at the railroad crossing where military posts were, about 250 meters
from the central station at Brona Gura, they stopped
the boxcars close to the prepared graves and they discharged people in the area
which was surrounded by barbed wire. They ordered the people to undress, to
throw their clothes on the ground, and they were left stark naked. Then they
drove them by a kind of narrow path between barbed wire fences toward the
graves. The first ones descended to the graves by a stairway and were forced to
lay face down, one next to another. After filling the first “layer”, Germans
dressed in the uniforms of the ASD and SS shot them with automatic
weapons. . In the same way they filled
the second and third layer until the graves were filled. The men, women and
children’s screams were heart braking. After shooting all the citizens, their
clothes and personal effects were loaded in the boxcars and the train took off
for an unknown destination.
The
arrival and discharge of people in the boxcars was carried out under the severe
surveillance of the chiefs, named Pikeh and Schmidt
(German origin) at the Brona Gura
station. In order to erase all signs of the cruelties made in Brona Gura, Germans shot all the citizens (more than 1000 people)
that inhabited the area which, in the past, was a military outpost.
At
the place where the terrible slaughter was done, there were seven large graves.
The first was 63 meters long and 6,6 meters wide. The second was 36 meters long
and 6.5 wide. The third was 36 meters long and 6 meters wide. The fourth was 37
meters long and 6 meters wide. The fifth was 52 meters long and 6 meters wide.
The sixth was 24 meters long and 6 meters wide. The seventh was 16 meters long
and 4.5 wide. All ranged from 3.5 to 4 meters deep.
From
June until November of 1942, the Germans murdered more than 30.000 citizens in
Brona Gura.
Sisters
Katzav wrote:
October 14, 1942: the ghetto trembled.
Something passed on the other side of the barbed fence. There were tumults.
Large number of policemen asked, “What happened?” At dusk they dispersed and
people calmed down a little. On October, 15 at 6am,.a neighbor woke us up and
told us that the Ghetto was walled, and therefore new things happened. It is
difficult to describe what had happened. Some hid in previously prepared caves,
and those that did not have a place to hide, ran down the streets from one side
to another like crazy people.
Comrade Sikorsky wrote:
October
15, 1942 the Ghetto was surrounded by units of the SS and the ASD. At 6 am. the
bloodletting began. The Hitlerist murderers entered
the houses and, the women, old men and babies were dragged outside. They
ordered them to stand in lines and they killed them .
The
Germans used many cruel ways of causing painful suffering and death. These
murderers did not have pity. This is told with clarity in the official document
of the Council. Germans brought more than 100 citizens of diverse towns near
Brest to the camp near the Bereza station with the objective of erasing all the
signs of the cruelties done in 1944. They forced the citizens to open the
graves and to burn the cadavers. The fire burned day and night for 15 days.
They used wooden carts as fuel from 48 military posts and from barracks that
were nearby. After the work of burning the cadavers was done, the Germans shot
and burned the citizens. On this common grave, the Germans planted small trees.
In some places there were remains of human bones that the fire did not
consume. Also there was women's hair,
dresses, children's shoes, soviet silver coins, and boy's arms. Besides the
evidence picked up by the members of the Council, there are people's
testimonies like ROMAN STANISLABOVICH NOVIS, IVÁN VASILEVICH GOBIN, BORISLAV
MICHAILOVICH SHETSHINSKY, GREGORY GREGORIEVICH YATZKEVICH and other witness who
told all that their eyes saw.
Members of Soviet
investigation team were taken to another terrible place about 50 meters from Smoliarka village in the area of Brona Gura
and 70 meters from the Moscow - Warsaw road. In this document of the council it
was stated, "Soviet citizens of the city of Bereza and of the villages of
this area were transported in trucks to the graves, to a place. The sufferings
and the slaughters of the peaceful inhabitants of the Smoliarka
village was similar to those of the genocide in Brona Gura. Five common graves were found and they all
contained Soviet citizens. Each sepulcher had the same measures: 10 meters
long, 4 meters wide and 2.5 meters deep. The genocide of Soviet citizens in the
area of the Smoliarka village was carried out in
September 1942. There they shot, according to eyewitness, about 1000 persons.
The murders were confirmed by IVÁN IVANOVICH GANTZ, IVÁN STEPHANIVTZ GANTZ,
ANDREI IVANOVITZ LEVKOVITZ, YOSEF YAKUBALVIICH KUTANIK and others.
Also
written in the Black Book is the following, "In the document of the
Commission we read these last words: In the Brona Gura
area Germans destroyed the railroads, and other elements in the station. During
the retreat, they blew up the tracks, set
the buildings on fire and destroyed the railroads using special
machinery. The units that destroyed the railroads were called Fimashchug. The commandant was the German Captain Sporberg. The damage caused to the station of Brona Gura was considerate, in rubles 1,150,000. According to the
investigation of witness and according to other data picked up in the Brest
area, the Commission estimates that the genocide of Soviet citizens in Brona Gura and near Smoliarka, both of
the Bereza area was carried out by the
ASD and SS headed by following people:
1.
Chief of the Office of Zonal Police in
Brest, Mayor Rodhe (until the beginning of
1944).
2.
Chief of the Office of Zonal Police in Brest, Biger
(from remainder of 1944 until the expulsion of the Germans from Brest).
3.
Chief of the First Police Station of the city of Brest, Levitant
Hoffman
4.
Chiefs of the First Police Station of the city of Brest, Maister
Holter, Maister Grober and Maister Bos.
5.
Chief of the Second Police Station of the city of Brest, Levitant
Frizinger (until the beginnig
of 1944).
6.
Chief of Police in Judicial Issues: S. D. Oubershpirer
Zanatzky (German)
7.
Major of Judicial Police: Ivanovsky (Polish)
8.
Under commandant of ASD: Houbershturmphirer Tzibel.
9.
Chief of Gendarmerie "Gavitskomisariat"
Captain Davarlain.
10 In
charge of evacuating murders: official of the ASD, Garik
11
Chief of the Gendarmerie in Kartuz Bereza: Ouberlevitant
Gross
12
Official of the ASD: Griber, Wuntzman
directly responsible for the murders.
The
signatures of the members of the Council were shown here
These
names were from memory by the eyewitness and they also added them to "The
list of murderers that deserved the fair punishment that was given to
them.
The
end of the notes from the Brest Chapter of the
"Black Book."