Murder Story of Rokitno Jews in the Forest in the Tutowicze Area

…That was the last time we saw our mother, our father, and our five-year-old brother, Moishe. We found our later that our father had been captured with other survivors of the shooting in the market square and taken to the Sarny area. He was shot in the ravines near the brick factory, along with some 18,000 other Jews who died horrible deaths in that awful place. Eyewitness accounts of the massacre say that the ground, covered with hundreds of bodies, was heaving for days, because of the people who had been buried alive.…

February 15, 1945 … [After the liberation of Rokitno by the Red Army in 1944,] we returned to the town and entered the house of a Christian neighbor. She told us that my mother and daughter had run away [from the market square] and returned to the house. My mother put the baby to sleep. A German came to their house, beat them, and took them to the railway station. The train left for [the town of] Sarny. My husband and brother managed to run away, [but were caught].… On the next day, they, too, were taken by train toward Sarny. They met my mother and daughter [at the Poleska camp]. For 3 days [sic], they were tortured and abused there, [before being killed]. My husband was fetching water for our daughter in his shoe….

On August 26, 1942, the last roll call of the ghetto inmates was carried out [in the market square]. As I stood next to my father, Avraham, I heard shouts: "German policemen are surrounding us!" I ran away to the synagogue courtyard, hid in the garbage bin, and covered myself with its lid. Several minutes later, a German approached me, took me out of the bin, threatening to kill me all the while, and took me to the railway station. …There were freight cars, of the type used to transport animals, parked near the [railway] station. They were surrounded with a large detachment of guards armed with machine guns. We were loaded into the cars, being packed so tightly that one could suffocate. Some of us were wounded, and these individuals were hovering between life and death. Upon arriving in Sarny, we were taken out of the cars, as though we were sheep being led to the slaughter. My mother, Hava-Shifra, whom I caught in my arms, was among the last ones to be taken out.… From the railway station, we were led to a large plot of land beyond the railway tracks, which was fenced off with barbed wire… [i.e., the Poleska camp]. The heat was unbearable. The SS men, who had been reinforced by Ukrainian [auxiliary] policemen, were standing around us with machine guns. A short while later, we were joined by Jews from Dąbrowica, Bereżnica, Klesów, and Tomaszgorod. We had not had anything to eat for the whole day. We were awaiting our fate with aching hearts. In exchange for gold and jewelry, we obtained some water, which was brought by the locals in a boot or a hat. The people were jostling near the fence, eager to take a gulp of water. The Germans were shooting the crowded people, injuring and killing many of them.... For a time, there were rumors that we would be taken to a central place, where the families would be divided, and the young ones would be sent to perform forced labor. For a day and a night, we stood in that plot of land, tense and frightened, and we didn't sleep a wink.… A rumor spread by word of mouth claimed that the Judenrat in Sarny was working to get us released. This illusion gave us encouragement and hope.… But, [finally,] the Jews of Sarny were [also] brought [to the Poleska camp], and this spelled the end of our hopes. The [camp] became ever more crowded. We sensed that something awful was about to happen. At 3 PM, the Jews of Rokitno were informed by the Jewish police that they should get ready to go. We understood that we were being led to the slaughter, since we had to bring the killed and wounded individuals along with us. On the way to the valley of death, the Nazis were photographing the death march. I will never forget the shock that I experienced when I beheld the pits from far away. My mother told me in a whisper: "My beloved son, these are the final moments of our lives, and there will not be a single person left to recite the "Kaddish" [the Jewish prayer for the dead] over me."… We reached the pits. We were surrounded by SS men and Ukrainian policemen with automatic weapons and machine guns, and they were ready and willing to annihilate us. The fear of death dulled our senses, and we stood there paralyzed, lined up in groups of four…. We were ordered to strip naked. The men were separated from the women and children. I said goodbye to my mother and went to stand in the fourth line in front of the pits. At the same time, I decided to run away at any cost. I whispered in the ears of those standing next to me that they should seize their chance and run away, since we had nothing to lose either way. That way, at least we wouldn't have to see the flowing blood of our loved ones. We bolted away, calling "Shema Yisrael" ["Hear, O Israel!" a Jewish prayer], and broke into a run with our remaining strength. We stood up and fell down, while the murderers were firing at us from all directions. I reached the forest alone, naked as the day I was born.…