Murder Story of Krugloye Jews on Krupskaya Street in Krugloye

…Then in May 1942 all of them [the Jews] were collected, they were more than 200… We were sitting on the river bank and saw lots of people being taken away. They were walking very quietly. They were led along Moprovskaya Street, then along Sovetskaya Street; however, at the murder site there was no street, there was a park that remained from an old estate...People said there were about 270 people. All had good clothes of different kinds, some were wearing shawls. They were wearing their best clothes. Policemen accompanied the column on both sides; they were followed by 8 Germans from the SS in black uniforms with death heads. The Jews were taken to anti-tank trenches, near the river, which had been dug at the beginning of the war as a preparation for the defense of the town. There they stopped...A German officer with a tall cap stepped forward and read something. I heard a general hiss, like the sound of people exhaling, then sharp commands were given in German. Two elderly men started to run, but were caught and returned to the others. They were [all] ordered to undress. Those who had good underwear had to undress completely. All the clothes were collected and taken along our street to the police station. Afterwards policemen said that some of the people had died from heartbreak before the shots were fired. The people were ordered to lie down in the grave in groups of six and everyone was shot in the back of the head. One German fell into the grave - he was not able to shoot[...]

The last group was taken to the shooting in the beautiful spring morning in 1942, the exact month and day remain unknown. A lonely old woman named Domna, who lived in Slobodka village located on the opposite side of the river near the bridge where people come to Krugloye on foot, told about it. This Domna lived her entire life among the Jews and knew all the Jews in the village very well. In the morning of the shooting she was at the mill… Suddenly she heard terrible screams and noise. She dashed from the mill to the site leading to the bridge. She saw a horrible scene in front of her. It was very frightening and hard to describe. The huge crowd of the old people and the children, some half dressed and some naked, some wearing shoes and some barefoot, some wearing only their underwear and some completely naked, convoyed by the Fascists with dogs, were forced towards an unnamed stream that joined the river Drut' next to the mill. From the height of the mill's second floor everything was seen as plain sight. The forced [people] were crying, screaming, they fell on their knees and begged for mercy. The women were weeping holding their little children in their arms unwilling to separate from them. In response the Fascists kicked them and beat them with rifles forcing them to make bigger steps. The doomed people were brought to the edge of the deep and long trench (ravine) that had been there since the First World War. From the edge of the trench to its bottom there were more than three meters. In 1914-1917 the trench was out of use as the Germans left Krugloye without any battle. Later there was a slaughterhouse and the place was abandoned. As soon as the front line of the ghetto victims' column reached the river near the mentioned above trench the back part of the column was still moving forward thickening the rows. The site before the mentioned above unnamed stream and the river became full [with the people]. Several carts with the policemen, who were local residents, arrived at the same site. According to Domna's story she recognized many of them but she did not tell us the names. She also said many of the village residents also gathered together there. All of them stood at the distance from the people and watched the shooting, the scene of the people's liquidation. Domna said her heart sank and she was unable to cross the stream to get closer to the execution site. But she could see perfectly form the far. Although according to some local residents that very Domna "who was devoted to Jews and loved them" assisted the Germans herself….The Germans began the shooting of the victims with the teenagers. They, tormented and hardly able to move, were forced into the trench and put alive one over the other. They undressed them [the victims] and left them, literally naked, both the girls and the boys. The clothes taken from them was loaded onto the carts that stood nearby. Then two Germans went over the trench and finished them off with machine gun. The same way the shooting of the old people as well as of the women who remained alive after the previous shootings was caaried out. When the shooting was over the Fascists went over the trench for the second time and thoroughly covered the trench with the earth. The upper layer that was made on the top of the trench was levelled.The trench was full all along. The soil moved. There was silence at the site. The police took cart with the clothes away with them. This way the Jews in the village of Krugloye were finished off. At the same place between the unknown stream and the river Drut