Murder Story of Lwów Jews in the Prison on Łącki Street in Lwów

...The following days bring the verdict of the execution, a verdict pronounced by one community on another. A fanatic mob orgy of bloodshed and pillage began, but even so it took place according to certain system. The orchestrators here were the Germans. It is they who decided when to begin the pogrom, when to stop it, how long to torture the victims; whether until they lose consciousness or to slaughter them.... The Jews, now aligned in ranks, are forced to march to the execution site.... The march to Golgotha commences.... A wave of people surges up the steepled street toward the prison on Lackiego Street, a pitiful procession jeered by the crowds, beaten and driven by the executioners. Little children spit at the sight of Jews barely dragging themselves, as their elders set the example, as they insult, mock, and hit the victims. This nightmarish procession is creeping uphill for hours. The victims by now look like ghosts, blood trickling from their wounds.... Here and there one can see a tottering old woman or man supported by someone younger. After all, they are forbidden to stop and catch their breath. An old, exhausted man has suddenly fallen. Blood and foam trickled from his mouth. His pale lips whisper incomprehensible words. The jeering mob quiets for a moment; the procession halts. Those nearest to him try to rescue him, but a German soldier shoots in the direction of those surrounding the old man and beats them with the butt of his rifle while cursing them coarsely. In a moment the procession resumes walking toward the site of execution. The old man's corpse is flung aside. The mob keeps beating and deriding the victims. The huge prison courtyard is surrounded on all sides with a wooden wall that is more than two meters high on the site of the execution. A wide gate in front of the wall is lined by German guards and on both sides of the gate stand rows of Ukrainians wearing the uniforms of the Soviet militiamen. They are armed with iron-shod sticks and they greet the entering victims with a hail of blows and insults. The courtyard, thickly ringed with machine guns tended solely by the Germans, is interspersed with soldiers armed with light machine guns, pistols, and grenades, who ensure that no one escapes his fate or is spared even the least torture. Shouts and noise resound throughout the courtyard. The crowds cluster around the gate, which apparently have grown accustomed to the suffocated stench of the executed political prisoners' bodies, hurl curses and stones at each entering group of Jews as these totter under the blows, half conscious from the rocks thrown at their heads. they move lethargically as if in a dream, without will, under the duress of their torturers. Without resisting and delaying they carry, from one place to another, the corpses of the murdered political prisoners. Without prodding, they dig graves and wash the corpses. They do not even react when German soldiers strike them with their rifle butts, as dozens of their fellow victims fall and lose consciousness. Their executioners then order them to lift the bodies. Incessant shooting accompanies these tortures, but the shots no longer terrify the victims. Their only conscious thought and silent prayer is to be struck by a well-aimed bullet that will put an end to their suffering. The tortures grow more refined, beginning with the digging of graves, while the crowd flings curses and stones at them. The soldiers who supervise this [infernal] activity demand that they use a child's toy shovel or just their bare hands to dig a pit large enough and deep enough for a man to lie down in. If the task is completed on time, the soldiers promise a victim a direct shot in the heart, which excites derisive laughter from the onlookers. The less inventive German soldiers order the victims to wipe the gunpowder off their boots with their tongues, or to stand for hours facing the wall while the soldiers constantly cock their rifles or shoot point blank at the victims. Those shot down must be buried in mass graves by their comrades. The victims stand for hours in the summer heat, fainting from hunger and thirst, awaiting their execution as salvation. They mechanically bury those already shot, envying these still warm corpses their martyrdom.... The Ukrainian servants of the Germans dishonor these corpses, kick them and spit on them, but not before searching them thoroughly for anything of value. Despite the duration of the executions, the public's enthusiasm does not wane. The onlookers encourage them with shouts to become even more brutal. What ensues is competition of hitting the victims and kicking the corpses. Their crescendo of curses and shots silence the death rattle of the dying on this devilish day of slaughter.... Finally around 8 o'clock, the Germans order the ending of the pogrom....

...Everything began on Wednesday morning, July 2. The retreating Soviets left behind three prisons: ...the prison at the former police headquarters on Lecki Street.... [Its] population consisted mostly of criminals and political prisoners from the Lvov area. Many of them had been executed and buried in prison courtyard.... The Gestapo decided to reap a propaganda benefit.... For that purpose, Lvov Jews were to dig up the graves in the presence of a special commission, the work would be photographed, and the German propaganda machine would thereby acquire first-class material.... After that, all hell broke loose. The Germans seized Jews in their homes and on the streets and forced them to work in the prisons. For that purpose they called upon the services of the Ukrainian police force, which they had set up recently. The Polish and Ukrainian populace rendered whole-hearted assistance to the Germans...Every morning over one thousand Jews were assembled and would then be split up among the three prisons. Several hundred were put to work right away breaking open the concrete floors and removing the corpses. Other Jews were packed into a small courtyard or some prison cell and shot. Not all the unlucky ones who were assigned the job of opening the graves returned to their homes. Some, having fainted from the stench from the graves, were dragged out and shot immediately...Wearing gas masks, the German taskmasters, officers and soldiers, strolled among the Jewish workers with taunting cries such as "sweet is the vengeance." Great crowds of the "Aryan" residents of Lvov attended this horrendous spectacle. The prison square, the courtyard, the hallways were filled were filled with people who looked on with gleeful satisfaction and with an unconcealed Schadenfreude. From time to time hysterical voices could be heard: "Shoot them, the murderers!" Here and there a hand rose to help a German hit the Jews. In the first days of the occupation, over three thousand Jews perished in the Lvov prisons....

…The Łącki prison, on Łącki Street, was from the first established and guarded by SS-men. From accounts [I heard] I concluded… that many Jews were murdered in this prison….

…The Germans entered Lemberg [Lwów] on the first day of the outbreak of the Russian-German war. This was at the time of anniversary of Petlyura's death. The Ukrainians immediately started rioting and dragging Jews out of their houses, taking them for work or to the infamous Łącki Sapiechy [Sapiehy] Prison, where they were beaten to death by Ukrainian soldiers and civilians. I saw the gruesome deeds with my own eyes since my apartment was located next to the prison and through the window it was possible to see everything that was happening there…