- Headline
-
Escaped Russian Prisoner Tells of Mass Killing
- Publication Date
- Tuesday, November 30, 1943
- Historical Event
-
Germans Kill Thousands of Jews in Mass Shooting Outside Kiev
This database includes 222 articles about this event - Article Type
- Newspaper
- Location
- Page Section and Number
- 10
- Author/Byline
- Eddie Gilmore (AP)
- Article Text
- Kiev, Russia, via Moscow (AP)—About five miles outside Kiev to the south not far from the Dnieper river is one of the most horrible places in the world.
It is called "Babii Yar (wench's ravine)." There, the Rusisans[sic] say, between 60,000 and 80,000 Jews were killed by the nazis and their bodies were later burned.
I have been there, but I'll let the story tell itself.
We first were escorted there by Prof. Pavel Aloshin, the chief architect for the reconstruction of the Ukraine. He has been here during the whole time of the German occupation.
"I want you to see Babii Yar," he said. "I can't explain it, and I can't explain why the Germans did such a thing."
The ravine is about 40 feet deep, about 100 feet wide and about a half mile long. He did not know why it was called "Babii Yar.''
"In September, 1941." said Aloshin, "thousands of Jews were brought here. Their clothes were removed and in small groups they were mowed down by automatic gunners. Then they were buried. Recently they were dug up and burned by the Germans wanting to destroy all the evidence."
We asked him how he first heard of the slayings, and he said he heard about it from a German architect who bragged about the mass murders.
We walked into the ravine with the professor.
"I don't know what we'll find," he said, "because not long ago the Germans came out here as the Red army was advancing and burned the bodies on huge stoves."
Some Go Crazy
Aloshin said the digging up of the bodies and the burning was done by Russian war prisoners, some of whom went crazy after the grisly business was completed.
We walked along the ditch, which today seemed to be just sand.
Here and there were such things as fingers without hands. At another place was a half-burned shoe with flesh inside. There were several bones about.
We also uncovered lots of broken burned spactacles. There were several pairs of broken false teeth.
We went back to the city. Finally the authorities took us back to the ravine. A commission was holding an investigation prior to making a report to the central committee investigating atrocities.
We were introduced to three men, all Jews, who reported that they were formerly Red army soldiers who had been captured in Kiev and later brought here to burn bodies.
They were Efimir Vilkis, 33, a former porter in a Kiev railway station; Leonid Ostrovsky, 31, a former hat maker; and Vladimir Davidov, 28, a former carpenter.
Story Is Related
Vilkis did most of the talking.
He said that on August 14 he and the other war prisoners were rounded up and brought to a huge dugout near the ravine. There were about 100 soldiers with him, including Ostrovsky and Davidov.
On about August 19 of this year, the Germans marched him and the others into Babii Yar and giving them shovels told them to dig in the soft sand.
"We dug and began to come to bodies," Vilkis said. "There were hundreds of them. They made us take large tongs and drag these bodies up here.
"The Germans then made a layer of wood and then a layer of bodies and poured gasoline over them and set them on fire.''
Vilkis said hundreds of bodies were burned in this manner.
Asked how many he himself dragged to the fire he said he guessed about 4,000 or 5,000.
After the bodies were burned, Vilkis, with the others nodding assent, said the Germans used huge crushers to crush the bones and destroy the evidence.
About August 28 he saw the Germans building a new pyre. The word got around among the prisoners and they assumed that they were to be shot and burned.
"We began trying to figure out some way to escape and the best way seemed to be to make a key to fit the lock on our dugout door," he explained.
One of the prisoners was a former locksmith and he made such a key from a spoon.
A couple of nights later Vilkis said he and the other prisoners unlocked the dugout door and rushed into the ravine.
"We figured we would be killed anyway," he said, "so we yelled and shouted as we ran. Some of us were shot down, but we surprised the guards. There were not many about."
In the night he made his way to the country and hid there until the Red army entered the sector. - History Unfolded Contributor
- Christin U.
- Location of Research
- Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com)
Learn More about this Historical Event: Germans Kill Thousands of Jews in Mass Shooting Outside Kiev
- Mass Shootings of Jews During the Holocaust (Holocaust Encyclopedia)
- Mass Shootings at Babyn Yar (Babi Yar) (Holocaust Encyclopedia)
- Kamenets-Podolsk (Holocaust Encyclopedia)
- Operation “Harvest Festival” (Holocaust Encyclopedia)
- Einsatzgruppen: An Overview (Holocaust Encyclopedia)
- “Final Solution”: Overview (Holocaust Encyclopedia)
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