Tag #150494 - Interview #78242 (Ruvin Gitman)

We failed to evacuate. We lived too far from the railroad and failed to reach it. In about a month and a half Vinnitsa region was occupied by German and Romanian troops. We were under occupation. The occupiers established a Jewish ghetto in Koryshkov. This area was under the jurisdiction of Romania. There were many Jews from Chernovtsy and Romania in the ghetto. The village was fenced in with barbed wire and a gendarme post was built. The first group of people to arrive at the ghetto was accommodated in the pigsty and spent the whole winter there. There was no heating there, not even a small stove. They all died. The newcomers were accommodated in public facilities. They were overcrowded and dirty.

We lived in our house, but we occupied only one room. Other rooms were given to newcomers to the ghetto. My mother voluntarily took them to the house to help. I cannot say exactly how many people there were in the ghetto. There were six to eight thousand people before the war when each family lived in their house. During the occupation there were four or five families in every house. Life was very hard. It was impossible to get a wash, do the laundry or change. We had a garden and a kitchen garden that helped a little with the food situation, but we were still always hungry. My mother always shared whatever we had with the others. When we ran out of all food we starved along with the others.