Murder story of Nieśwież Jews in the Nieśwież Ghetto

My dear one, I am writing this letter and I don’t know whom it will reach. I am giving it to an acquaintance with the address of our friends. We are inside the ghetto with the yellow badges on our clothes, on ourselves, and on our sufferings – there aren’t any words to describe them nor is there the time. Death is staring us in the face. We are going to die with the knowledge that the world’s enemy will lose in the war and that there will be someone to take revenge. Until now a few of us are still being kept alive so that we can cover (the graves) a little, in a horrible way (so that in them) people who are still alive struggle in the face of terrible torture [emphasis in the source], not as we read in regard to Spain and other inquisitions (the latter can not be compared [with our present suffering]). Is there anything more terrible than this -, than burning a person at the stake, as was done in Spain -, throwing hundreds of children, before their mothers’ eyes, into a pit and burying them while they are still alive?… And their mothers are forced to see all this? To this day I am in Nieśwież with all my family. Chaim Meirke is with his family, including his father, in Baranowicze. His mother, peace be upon her, lost her mind and threw herself into a pit with water. We have been so hardened that we cannot shed any tears. We are waiting to die in order to be saved further disgrace and shame…. We are in Nieśwież and hear how, from day to day, those in that town are being killed and, now, it is our turn, today or tomorrow. We are lying down, in our clothes, with the children, so lovely and talented, and waiting for death…. My Hershele is a lovely lad, taller than I am, honest, intelligent, and talented. Yehuditke is a lovely girl, half a head taller than her mother, oh how lovely she is and, last but not least, Shlomele, a lovely boy, cute and sweet…. Oh, woe, woe to us! I promised the Christian who will send this letter that you will give him a reward after the war. Sholom Mordechai Khishin July 18, 1942 [illegible] sent the letter to Hannah Tchernikhov, No. 61 Levinsky Street, Tel Aviv