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1 Execution site(s)
Veronika K., born in 1928:
“Y.U.: Were they all shot at the same place?
Witness: No. One in the back of a vegetable patch, another one in the bushes.
Y.U.: Where did you see it happen?
Witness: I saw it.
Translator: Where?
Witness: In Sudilovichi.
Translator: Where, precisely? Where in Sudilovichi?
Witness: There, on the outskirts of the village. They were taken to the edge of the village and shot there.
Y.U.: In the forest?
Witness: No! Right near the bushes.
Witness: Then we ran away and hid by the Russian stove inside the house.
Y.U.: Was the site near the road?
Witness: No, not on the road. They went to the bushes. No one looked for them and no one found them. They were buried there, they’re still there. The bushes grew over their graves.
Witness: Where were they from?! They were brought here in trucks and shot.
Translator: Were these people from Sudilovichi, or were they brought here from somewhere else?
Witness: They were brought here from somewhere.
Witness: I don’t know where the Germans with the metal signs brought them from. I remember they came to our house and asked for shovels. That was all.” (Witness n°1042B, interviewed in Osintorf, on November 1, 2019)
Sudilovichi is located in the Vitebsk region, 7 km away from Osintorf and 80 km (50 mi) southeast of Vitebsk. According to local residents, there were no Jews living in the village on regular basis before the war. The majority of Jews lived in the nearby town of Dubrovno, 14km away. The area is known for its peat deposits. During the 1920s, it became an industrial region where many people from all over the Soviet Union were sent to work on peat extraction.
Sudilovichi was occupied by the Germans in mid-July 1941. During our field research, Yahad - In Unum was able to identify the execution site of an isolated killing. The victim was a Jewish blacksmith who came from another town or village nearby to hide. It was impossible to establish when he was killed, but probably in the spring of 1942, when the majority of the mass shootings in this area were conducted. The artisans from Dubrovno were executed in March 1942, for example. Today, the site remains without any memorial.
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