Rudnya - Commemoration of Jewish Victims

Rudnya Jewry felt the need to commemorate their family members who were killed in the town during the Holocaust. The Jews of Rudnya conducted memorial ceremonies and brought flowers and wreaths to the presumed murder site since its exact location was unknown. The people also tried to obtain permission to build a memorial to the Jewish victims, as well as to get financial support for this, but their requests were rejected by the local authorities. They managed to locate the mass grave and to mark its boundaries only in July 1964. The remains of the Jewish victims were taken from the murder site and reburied in the local Jewish cemetery on July 25, 1964. The initiative group of local Jews eventually succeeded in collecting money from Rudnya's Jews and in receiving permission and financial support from the local authorities to erect a monument at the Jewish cemetery. "The Mourning Mother" memorial to the Rudnya Jewish victims was unveiled in October 1965. The monument was designed by the famous sculptor Lev Kerbel, whose family had lived in Smolensk. The inscription on the memorial does not contain any mention of the Jewish origin of the victims but has a poem by the local author Nikolay Rylenkov. The following is a literal prose translation of the Russian inscription: "I am the Motherland: I am as sleepless as conscience. I remember every moan of the people who were tortured to death. Executioners, be aware there is no law more sacred than the lex talionis ['a tooth for a tooth,' etc.]" Later, in July 1969, the same initiative group was responsible for the placing on the monument of memorial plaques with a list of the Jewish victims. According to some sources, on the eastern outskirts of Rudnya there is a memorial to the Jewish victims of Mikulino who were shot on February 24, 1942, together with partisans and Communists of Rudnya County and their family members.