Murder Story of Rudnya Jews on the Smolensk Road

On October 21, 1941 it was announced that the ghetto population was to be relocated to Smolensk. The people were ordered to take all the belongings they needed and two kilograms of food with them. At 2 p.m. the column of Jews was taken along the road to Smolensk. When the column reached the outskirts of Rudnya it was turned aside, toward an anti-tank trench. The Germans took away their outer clothing, all their valuables, and food from the Jews. The Jews were shot from submachine- guns and machine-guns. The children, including infants, were thrown into the pit alive or were thrown into the air and shot. Thus, about 1,000 people were shot. The Germans barely covered the pit with earth and also threw heavy stones into the trench, thus breaking the bones of those victims who were wounded but still alive. About 200-300 artisans were left alive on that day. At the beginning of November 1941 about 200 Jews from Mikulino, Krasnoye, and other places near Rudnya were taken to the ghetto of Rudnya. Some of them were shot on November 24, 1941 and the rest - around 500 people - on February 24, 1942. The murder operations took place at the same anti-tank trench.