Murder story of Wiśniowiec Nowy Jews in the Wiśniowiec Ravine

… In [the first days of] August [1942] a rumor spread [through the ghetto] about a murder operation [that was imminent]. We knew that our end was near. Before the liquidation [of the ghetto] the Germans informed the Judenrat that the people could [temporarily] leave the ghetto in order to retrieve from their houses their valuables [that apparently had been hidden]. [The Jews were told that] some of them [the possesions] would have to be handed over to the authorities, while they could keep some of them. Those who carried out this order would remain alive. The more [of these belongings the ghetto inmates] gave to the Germans, the better it would be for them [the Jews]. The Jews left [the ghetto] – some to their [former] homes [located] in the vicinity, others to their [former homes located] far away. Everyone was guarded by a [Ukrainian auxiliary] policeman. The Jews from [the nearby town of] Wyżgródek went to Wyżgródek, with policemen accompanying them or to nearby villages. The Jews were hopeful [about the German order]. They entered [their homes], found their valuables, and took them [back to the ghetto]. [However, in the end] they [the ghetto inmates] did not survive. Right after the Jews returned [to the ghetto] with their last precious belongings, the ghetto was closed for three days. Inside the ghetto the houses were locked, those who attempted to move from one house to another were shot and killed in the street. We knew what was awaiting us. A premonition of death was lurking in every cell of our minds. It was terrible. With the approach of the liquidation [of the ghetto] we saw the Wiśniowiec Judenrat in all its tragic glory. Pure-hearted Jews, pure souls who sacrificed themselves for every small thing for their fellow-sufferers [the ghetto's inmates].… Among them Koylnbrener, the chairman of Judenrat, stood out. He was not a local person but had arrived [in Wiśniowiec] from some other place as a refugee from Katowice or Ślask [sic, for Łodź]…. During the murder operation he had the possibility of remaining alive. The Germans offered this to him, but he [refused] and joined the common death procession. He took advantage of their [the Germans'] favor and asked to be the first one to be shot - in order not to see the death of his dear flock. They [the Germans] agreed to his request. That is what people said. The members of the Judenrat were the first to die [during the murder operation].…

On rosh chodesh [the first day of the month of] Elul [i.e. on August 14] 1943 [sic, for 1942] about 10 SS men from [the town of] Krzemieniec arrived in the town [of Wiśniowiec], they gathered dozens of armed Ukrainian [auxiliary] policemen from all the [town's] vicinity, positioned all [these] policemen in rows, and one of the SS men, who was standing near the great master, [i.e.] Herr Steiger, the killer of the Wiśniowiec Jewry, stood up and delivered a short speech, which I heard in its entirety, and I can't forget even now [i.e. many years later]. He said: "Today we are going to wipe out all the Jews of the ghetto. Go, knock on every window and entrance and tell the Jews: "Jewish Communist traitors, come out of your homes." [Those] Jews who refuse to come out, beat them with the butts of your machine-guns. Pay attention: you may hit them mercilessly, but take care not to kill them inside the ghetto. Take them outside of town, to the place designated for this [purpose], and eliminate them there." To this day I can not understand why he didn't want to annihilate us inside the ghetto. While they [the Jews] were on their way on foot from the ghetto [to the murder site], blows were inflicted upon the walkers [Jews] until they [almost] lost their minds. There were cases when people [who were walking] in rows became hysterical. While walking together with the others, they began to pull out their hair and to inflict injuries on themselves; there were [also] those who tore their clothes while uttering heart-rending laments. [Thus] Yente Klein took off her clothes until she arrived at the pit completely naked. Young girls were screaming and weeping, one of them stood up and turned to other girls with a terrifying speech that was quite mad: "Why can't we all become married? Why can't we satisfy a man's desire? Why are we not allowed to try this? What is this [kind of] death that had been chosen for us even before we were able to be married." A large truck accompanied the walkers [who had come from the ghetto] and the Ukrainians [auxiliary policemen] were loading onto it the elderly, blind and infirm people, and infants. All those who lagged behind the [death] procession, [i.e.] wounded people, sick ones, and those whose legs had swelled up from hunger, were thrown onto the truck. They [the people] were throw into the truck on top of each other…. The Ukrainian guards were sitting on top of the piled up bodies as if they were sitting on the top of a bundle of straw or a pile of wood. It is terrible to recall the [self-]importance of the murderers… who were sitting on top of helpless people who couldn't resist them, "the superior ones." I was walking beside my wife, holding in my arms my daughter Rivkale, who was 21 months old, [while] my wife was holding Hanale, who was four and a half years old. Suddenly several [Ukrainian] policemen approached us, grabbed our children from our arms and threw them onto the truck as if they were bundles of rags. When we were being separated, I wanted to accompany them with a last glance, to let them know that I would love them forever. They [the guards] sensed this, and struck me with a gun butt so hard that I was pushed from where I was standing and forced [to continue] on the way which all the others were treading. At the beginning of the way [to the murder site], Judke Shag and his 4-year-old child joined [the column]. The boy pushed between his father's knees and screamed a cry of madness and plea: "Father, don't go! Where are we going? Let's go back!" Judke took him in his arms and went along [with the column]. At that moment a Ukrainian [policeman] approached him, tore [the boy] from his arms, threw him into the truck and, thus, separated them. From the very beginning we were led in groups… of 200-300; when I pushed myself [back into the column] after I had stopped to look at my children for the last time, I found myself not in my group and [thus] separated from my wife. I never saw her again. By chance, my brother was in this group, so I continued [walking along] with him. While we were walking over the bridge [that separated] the new town and the old town [of Wiśniowiec], [several] German trucks came towards us and we had to make way for them. I was pushed aside, my head was spinning, I stumbled and fell into the [Goryn] river. At that very minute I recovered; life returned to me and I crawled … and hid. Since I did not hear any shots and I saw that [the executioners] had not noticed that I was missing, … I remained hidden.… [After he had been caught in hiding by the Ukrainian policemen several days later, Zeev Sobol, along with some others, was taken to the town's synagogue, where he met two young men who had witnessed the murder operation and remained alive, and that is what they told him]: "The people were gathered at the ravine located behind the old town, on the road leading [to the town of] Zbaraż, this ravine served as a … mass grave for us, its capacity had the dimensions desired by the Nazis. [Still] Ukrainian peasants were broadening the ravine. They were standing with their working tools, scraping away at the surface of the ravine. They flattened it, … and dug out its walls, … covered [with stones and earth] the bottom [of the ravine] in order to create some kind of loose dirt bed for those who were going to be murdered. When this was ready, a first group of Jews was driven towards the burial site; before that two [Ukrainian] policemen ordered them to strip to their underwear. They undressed and put their clothes into a pile. When they [the victims] remained [only] in their undershirts and underpants, they were forced to lie facedown in one row inside the ravine, [and], when all of them were lying [in the pit] facedown, the policemen shot them with hand-held machine-guns. They [the weapons] were operating all the time, firing bullets into the heads of the recumbent people. After this operation, they [policemen] carried out an inspection [i.e. a check to see if all those shot had been killed]. They passed from one [victim] to another, approaching those [victims] who had not died immediately, killing them with their pistols … aiming silently into the center of the [victim's] skull. When they had finished with one group, they dealt with another one, and so on. The Ukrainian [auxiliary policemen] were walking inside the ravine over the bodies [of the victims], demonstrating a terrible diligence. They took the bodies that were protruding and arranged them in straight lines. The Germans sat above the walls of the ravine, supervising the work; they gave the orders and the Ukrainian [auxiliary policemen] carried them out. When the Ukrainian policemen finished with [these] examinations and straightening the layers [of the victim's bodies] after the last shootings, the [local Ukrainian] peasants covered with earth the [most recent] layer of murder victims in order to make it possible to place the next layer [of victims] on top of the previous one. They covered [the bodies] using hoes, with a thin layer of earth; [thus] the [murder site] area was once again ready for another layer of bodies. The clothes that had been piled up were given to the peasants as a reward for their work. They [the peasants] immediately collected the murdered peoples' clothes and loaded them onto carts. While some [the Germans and Ukrainian policemen] were engaged in the murder operation and in dealing with the bodies, the others [i.e. the peasants] were leaving [the murder site] with wagons to take [the clothes] that they had just acquired to sell them.…"