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Rumors were going round that something was being prepared. On 3rd December a decree was issued by the chief official that on the morning of 4th December at 7.00, all the Jews, old and young, with their children, were to gather on the square outside our house, the market square, because there were to be injections against typhus. Tables were set up at certain points, and there were Jewish doctors and Jewish nurses. Around 7.30 there were already about 2,500 people on the square. Among them we saw from our window Grandma Menia leading Granddad Berl by the hand; we saw many of our relatives, friends and neighbors from our windows. Everybody was going for those injections. People said that after the injections young, strong people were going to be transported east, to forced labor camps. Suddenly, around 7.30-8.00 lorries drew up from all sides, and out of them jumped Germans and Ukrainian policemen. The whole of that huge square was fenced in, because during the period of the Soviet rule they had been planning to make it into a park, and that park was surrounded by police. And with shouts and yells and beatings they began to herd the Jews into the big synagogue through a single entrance. Because we could see what was happening through the window, Mama said to Father and to us: 'You' - meaning Father, Mojsze Mendel and me - 'go up into the loft, and the little ones' - meaning Szmulek and Mordechaj - 'and I will stay here, because they won't do anything to us.'
A moment after we had obeyed Mama, gone up into the loft and hidden under the planks, we heard the familiar voice of a Petliurist [see Petliura, Simon] [18]. He was called Vasil Chepurda, a man who made a living chopping wood, bringing water from the well, lighting the stove on Saturdays - a shabesgoy. And Chepurda started shouting at our Mama, 'You so-and-so, get out there at once!' And Mama said to him, 'But Vasil, you know us, why are you acting like this?' But he drove Mama and the children out of the house. It turned out that the Germans had a lot of Chepurdas. In that way they herded several hundred people out of their homes and into the synagogue. And we lay up there in the loft for over 24 hours, and then suddenly, through a chink in the wall we saw our uncle Froim Kupferman, the tailor, my mom's eldest brother, running towards the house from the direction of the synagogue.
What happened in the synagogue we only found out a few days later. Some Germans had got 'their' Jews out with the permission of the Gestapo. Beside Uncle Froim, a dozen or so locksmiths, carpenters, glaziers, people they still needed, were released. By all accounts Dantesque scenes took place in that synagogue. Over 2,600 people had been rounded up, it was cramped, packed, the stench - they relieved themselves where they were standing - the screams and cries of the Jews: 'What are you doing? This is a holy place!', beating, without food or water... In any case, a lot of people died, suffocated there. That lasted all day on the 4th and all night. Not until 5.00 or 5.30 in the morning did lorries draw up outside the synagogue and they started to load people onto them. They were taken about a dozen kilometers to the village of Siemakowce, where huge pits had been dug the day before. There they were undressed, made to walk another 50 meters or so through the snow, and with a shot, usually in the back of the head, they were killed on the spot. Out of that whole mass of humans murdered there, seven people managed to survive; they climbed out of the pit in the night and found their way back to Horodenka.
They were six adults and one child. For ten days later, our uncle, Hersz Gutman, from the village of Kolanki, brought back our eleven-year-old brother Szmulek on a cart. He was still in shock, but we managed to get out of him the story of what had happened there. Our Mama had thrown the children into the pit, jumped in herself and covered both brothers with her own body. She was killed. Mordechaj too. Szmulek, lying underneath her, was only grazed slightly. He had lain among the corpses all day, and in the evening, when the shooting had stopped, he got out of the pit. There was a lot of clothing there, because some of them had undressed in the designated place and gone on almost naked, some had shed their clothes as they went; in any case he found some rags there, put them on, found some shoes, and went in the direction of the village in search of human settlements. He reached a farm, climbed inside a haystack and was detected early in the morning by a dog and found by a good farmer. He took the child home, washed and fed him and gave him some hot milk, and kept him there for three days. After three days he extracted from him the information that our uncle Hersz Gutman, my Grandma Menia's brother, ought to be living in the village of Kolanki. The peasant drove him to our uncle in his cart. Uncle Hersz kept Szmulek at his home for a few days and in the end after about ten days brought him - his horses had not yet been confiscated - to us in Horodenka, and we couldn't believe the miracle.
A moment after we had obeyed Mama, gone up into the loft and hidden under the planks, we heard the familiar voice of a Petliurist [see Petliura, Simon] [18]. He was called Vasil Chepurda, a man who made a living chopping wood, bringing water from the well, lighting the stove on Saturdays - a shabesgoy. And Chepurda started shouting at our Mama, 'You so-and-so, get out there at once!' And Mama said to him, 'But Vasil, you know us, why are you acting like this?' But he drove Mama and the children out of the house. It turned out that the Germans had a lot of Chepurdas. In that way they herded several hundred people out of their homes and into the synagogue. And we lay up there in the loft for over 24 hours, and then suddenly, through a chink in the wall we saw our uncle Froim Kupferman, the tailor, my mom's eldest brother, running towards the house from the direction of the synagogue.
What happened in the synagogue we only found out a few days later. Some Germans had got 'their' Jews out with the permission of the Gestapo. Beside Uncle Froim, a dozen or so locksmiths, carpenters, glaziers, people they still needed, were released. By all accounts Dantesque scenes took place in that synagogue. Over 2,600 people had been rounded up, it was cramped, packed, the stench - they relieved themselves where they were standing - the screams and cries of the Jews: 'What are you doing? This is a holy place!', beating, without food or water... In any case, a lot of people died, suffocated there. That lasted all day on the 4th and all night. Not until 5.00 or 5.30 in the morning did lorries draw up outside the synagogue and they started to load people onto them. They were taken about a dozen kilometers to the village of Siemakowce, where huge pits had been dug the day before. There they were undressed, made to walk another 50 meters or so through the snow, and with a shot, usually in the back of the head, they were killed on the spot. Out of that whole mass of humans murdered there, seven people managed to survive; they climbed out of the pit in the night and found their way back to Horodenka.
They were six adults and one child. For ten days later, our uncle, Hersz Gutman, from the village of Kolanki, brought back our eleven-year-old brother Szmulek on a cart. He was still in shock, but we managed to get out of him the story of what had happened there. Our Mama had thrown the children into the pit, jumped in herself and covered both brothers with her own body. She was killed. Mordechaj too. Szmulek, lying underneath her, was only grazed slightly. He had lain among the corpses all day, and in the evening, when the shooting had stopped, he got out of the pit. There was a lot of clothing there, because some of them had undressed in the designated place and gone on almost naked, some had shed their clothes as they went; in any case he found some rags there, put them on, found some shoes, and went in the direction of the village in search of human settlements. He reached a farm, climbed inside a haystack and was detected early in the morning by a dog and found by a good farmer. He took the child home, washed and fed him and gave him some hot milk, and kept him there for three days. After three days he extracted from him the information that our uncle Hersz Gutman, my Grandma Menia's brother, ought to be living in the village of Kolanki. The peasant drove him to our uncle in his cart. Uncle Hersz kept Szmulek at his home for a few days and in the end after about ten days brought him - his horses had not yet been confiscated - to us in Horodenka, and we couldn't believe the miracle.
Period
Interview
tomasz miedzinski