Murder Story of Małoryta Jews at the Małoryta Jewish Cemetery

One day in June, at about 5–6 PM, the Germans, the Gestapo staff, and local policemen surrounded the ghetto and began to arrest Jewish men; they [the Jewish men], with their hands up, were convoyed to a hill beyond the village, where they were shot in groups. The ghetto inmates were mad with fear, and panic spread among them; many tried to run away, but were shot on the spot by the guards. By 9–10 PM, the entire male population of the ghetto had been shot. The residents of the houses next to the ghetto were ordered to lie on the floor, and were forbidden under pain of death to go outside, or even to look out the windows. The women and children who remained in the ghetto were taken to a single spot and held there under German guard, in the open air, throughout the night. The following morning, at 4 AM, the shooting of the women and the children commenced. They were taken out of the ghetto in groups and led under convoy to Pieszczanka. Many of the women were holding their babies in their arms and leading their older children by the hand. By midday, it was all over, and no Jews remained in the ghetto. The mass shootings in Pieszczanka were carried out with the cruelty and brutality that was characteristic of the German Gestapo executioners. They lined their victims in front of the pit and shot them with volleys of submachine gun fire. The wounded and the dead alike fell into the pit. The mothers were shot together with the children in their arms. Cries and moans, and the weeping of the children, issued from the bloody pit. The Germans ordered the policemen to finish off the children inside the pit. The wounded people were moaning in the pit, and the Germans covered them with soil. The Germans took away the victims' clothes and shoes, which were later shipped to Małoryta in carts. The Jewish property that was left behind in the ghetto was looted by the Germans and the policemen.