The stages of execution

The hundreds of testimonies collected by Yahad-In unum and the archival documents allow us to better understand the course of the assassinations committed in the context of the Shoah. The organization of the killings, if it involves variations according to the places, the importance of the cities or villages concerned, follows a similar course and methods in all regions orIn Unum has conducted his investigation to date.

The exhibition of the Holocaust Memorial describes in detail the 8 stages highlighted by the researchers of Yahad-In Unum. The course presents texts and documents from archives as well as excerpts of testimonies, edited extracts of the stories of Ukrainian witnesses interviewed by the team of Yahad-In Unum.

1 - The Germans organize the preparations for the killings:

Jews are summoned by means of billboards, radio or loudspeakers; Ukrainians are conscripted.

The Germans order the Jews to gather at a specific location, equipped with warm clothing and food for several days. In small towns or villages, they contact the mayor of the village who provides them with a list of inhabitants and then only have to go to their victims' homes to arrest them.

The seizure of Ukrainian civilians by the Germans is a common and frequent occurrence in the towns and villages of Ukraine. The peasants, men and women, often very young, are called upon to dig pits, transport Jews, close the pits.

2 - The Jews are arrested, rounded up or locked up, then transported to the place of execution.

Several methods are used to arrest the Jews: the trick by announcing their transfer to the East, in Kiev or in Palestine; the assembly in ghettos; arrests at home.

Police officers roam the village, fields and forests for several days to find the Jews who are hiding in their attempt to escape arrest.

In all cases, the arrests are accompanied by many murders.

The Jewish victims are first taken from the place of assembly to the place of the first undressing near the place of execution either on foot, arranged in columns or on horse-drawn carts accompanied by armed guards, or in trucks in which there is also an armed guard.

3- The Jews wait near the place of execution, then they are undressed and their last possessions confiscated. A final selection is made.

The waiting area is not located next to the pit so that victims cannot see it. Sometimes the Jewish victims do not wait but are on the contrary led very quickly and under blows, to be shot as soon as they approach the pits.

In the majority of cases, the Jews have to undress completely, first taking off their warm clothes, which are going to be deposited in heaps or boxes previously arranged, then, later, they take off their other clothes. Jews who refuse are often killed on the spot.

4- The Kommando de fusillade set up, we place the victims on the edge of the pit. The order to execute is given.

Most of the time, Jews are executed with a single shot in the back, contrary to German military practice. This choice, explicitly mentioned by Paul Blobel himself, seems to have been made at the beginning of the shootings. For the rest, the commandos gradually established their methods of killing, after many and sordid debates. Following a «liquidation» which he witnessed in Minsk, around 15 August 1941, Himmler demanded that other methods of assassination be experimented with. The choice was made for gas trucks.

5- After the shooting the pits are blocked.

In exceptional cases, victims receive the final blow. In some areas, cremation of bodies is carried out.

After the shooting, the pit is refilled by throwing lime and soil in it. Often local people

They are requisitioned, with their equipment, who have to do the repair work and thus testify to the fact that many victims are still alive at this time.

6- The Germans have a party in the village.

Jewish clothing and goods are sorted, taken away, distributed or sold.

7 – Some Jews survive.

Yahad’s team found and interviewed some of these survivors who sometimes live only a few kilometers from the place where they escaped death.

8- The extermination site of Babi Yar in Ukraine.

When German troops invaded Kiev on 19 September 1941, nearly 100,000 Jews fled the city. Accused of preparing attacks and setting fires, the remaining Jews in Kiev are invited by a notice to gather at 8 o'clock in the morning on 29 September 1941 in order to be «resettled» elsewhere. They are then framed to the ravine of Babi Yar, north-west of the city where they are murdered by small groups on September 29 and 30, 1941. The report of Einsatzgruppe C to its headquarters reports 33,771 Jewish victims.

Hanna Antonivna Gonovalchiouk. Born 1921. Interviewed in Berditchev, Zhitomir region on 16 October 2005. Direct witness. Witness 251.
© Guillaume Ribot

Columns of Jews led under the guard of German soldiers in the streets of Kamenetz-Podolsk, Ukraine, to an execution site outside the city. 27 August 1941. Kamenetz-Podolsk, Ukraine.
© USHMM, courtesy of Ivan Sved

Jewish prisoners forced to undress before execution by Ukrainian auxiliaries. Photographer unknown. 1942. Chernigov, Ukraine.
© USHMM, courtesy of Magyar Nemzeti muzeum

Members of an Einsatzkommando firing at Jews in a field in Dubossary, Moldova. 14 September 1941. Dubossary, Moldova, USSR. Photographer not identified.
© USHMM, Imperial War Museum. Crown copyright. Rights reserved

Nina Roufimovna Lisitsina. Born 1939. Interviewed in Belogorsk, Crimea on 24 December 2004. Rescued. Witness 103.
© Guillaume Ribot