Peat Factory in Konotop Related Communities
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Murder Story of Belopolye Jews at the Peat Factory in Konotop
Murder Site
Peat Factory in Konotop
Ukraine (USSR)
Many of the Jews of Belopolye managed to evacuate or flee eastward shortly before the occupation, and only thirty Jews remained in the town when the Germans arrived. These Jews, along with other victims of the Nazi regime, had to undergo a registration.
The Jews, Communists, and other Soviet activists were forced to perform hard labor – e.g., cleaning the toilets and the local sewers, repairing the roads, and digging mass graves for those sentenced to death by the German military and the SS. Then, in early 1942, the Jews were relocated to a peat factory, where they had to work both day and night shifts in inhuman conditions. With their daily ration being limited to 100-150 grams of bread, they suffered from hunger.
In June 1942, the Germans transferred the twenty-four Jews who were still alive to Konotop and shot them there – probably at the brick factory, which also served as the killing site of other Jews from the Konotop region.
Related Resources
ChGK Soviet Reports
Yekaterina Rotenberg, who was born in 1906 and lived in Belopolye during the war years, testifies:
In September 1941, the Germans occupied the town of Belopolye.
From the first day, the German authorities introduced a special regime for us Jews. They sought to isolate us from the rest of the population; for example, we were forbidden to talk to local non-Jews, and risked being shot dead if we flouted this prohibition....
The German police confiscated all of the Jews' property and food, thereby condemning the Jews to starvation.
Furthermore, all the Jews, including the children, were taken out their apartments and relocated to a single apartment.
In early 1942, all the Jews living in the town of Belopolye were resettled in the peat factory, where they suffered from torture, exploitation, and meager rations (the people received only 100-150 grams of bread each day).
In the end, all of them, including the children, were taken to Konotop and shot there. The entire Jewish population of Belopolye, some thirty people in total, were shot dead.
GARF, MOSCOW R-7021-74-486 copy YVA M.33 / JM/19984
Peat Factory in Konotop
plant
Murder Site
Ukraine (USSR)
51.148;34.300