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I have a picture of graves of executed men and women in Yanovichi. They were two separate pits. Our fellow countrymen, who live in Moscow, Vitebsk and Leningrad, collected funds, got together, found the place of their burial and managed to arrange a small cemetery there. Our fellow countrymen visited these graves annually. However, I don’t know who visits them now. But the cemetery is safe and we were told that the borough council takes care of it.
I have a note here, a piece of newspaper, which is a notification about the death of my daughter and my sister’s family. It is just a scrap of paper, but it states clearly that the Yanovichi borough council received a letter from me and sent a reply to it: ‘Your relatives, Raisa Sigalevich, her husband Sigalevich, their younger son, your daughter Ada and Ada’s grandmother, your husband’s mother, Chaya-Isya, were executed by the Fascists on 10th September 1941. Lev Sigalevich is alive, he is a Red Army officer.’ He is the only relative of my husband who survived. I keep this note. I received this letter, a reply to my inquiry, from the Yanovichi borough council chairman. The letter is written in legible handwriting. They even wrote: ‘We grieve about the death of your family.’ The letter was written on a piece of newspaper and sealed up in the form of a soldier’s triangle. Looks like they didn’t even have a clean piece of paper, because this happened right after the liberation of Yanovichi from the Germans.
I have a note here, a piece of newspaper, which is a notification about the death of my daughter and my sister’s family. It is just a scrap of paper, but it states clearly that the Yanovichi borough council received a letter from me and sent a reply to it: ‘Your relatives, Raisa Sigalevich, her husband Sigalevich, their younger son, your daughter Ada and Ada’s grandmother, your husband’s mother, Chaya-Isya, were executed by the Fascists on 10th September 1941. Lev Sigalevich is alive, he is a Red Army officer.’ He is the only relative of my husband who survived. I keep this note. I received this letter, a reply to my inquiry, from the Yanovichi borough council chairman. The letter is written in legible handwriting. They even wrote: ‘We grieve about the death of your family.’ The letter was written on a piece of newspaper and sealed up in the form of a soldier’s triangle. Looks like they didn’t even have a clean piece of paper, because this happened right after the liberation of Yanovichi from the Germans.
Period
Year
1941
Location
Yanovichi
Vitebesk
Belarus
Interview
Blyuma Perlstein