Samotrzask | Masovian Voivodeship

/ Franciszek S. was an eyewitness to numerous shootings. © Kate Kornberg – Yahad-In Unum Yahad’s team during an interview. © Kate Kornberg – Yahad-In Unum At this place a Jewish shop was located. 17 people were buried here during autumn. © Kate Kornberg – Yahad-In Unum The mass grave where another Jewish woman was buried. © Kate Kornberg – Yahad-In Unum Franciszek S. showing two other mass graves located in the forest. 21 Jews are buried here (20 men and 1 woman). They were buried during winter. © Kate Kornberg – Yahad-In Unum All along the railways, there are mass graves where the Jews who jumped out the train attempting to escape are buried. © Kate Kornberg – Yahad-In Unum At this place witness saw a Jew who jumped out of the train and broke his legs. © Kate Kornberg – Yahad-In Unum At this place a policeman named Zielinski killed a couple of Jews. The bodies were buried on the spot. © Kate Kornberg – Yahad-In Unum

Execution of Jews in Samotrzask

13 Killing site(s)

Kind of place before:
Field, forest
Memorials:
No
Period of occupation:
1939-1944
Number of victims:
146

Witness interview

Franciszek S., born in 1928, recalls: “The tailor’s name who taught me was Koper. He was a very good man. I saw with my own eyes his wife being killed. This day, I brought food to Ms Koper but Kolodziej was in her garden. He asked me what I was doing here, and I responded. He told me to leave because if not, gendarmes were going to find me and kill me. I answered that I wasn’t afraid. She was happy about the food. Kolodziej entered and said “gendarmes are coming! Hide under the bed! And you get out!” I went out and I was 10 meters far from the house. He got out of the house, stopped the gendarmes and said: “A Jewish woman hid under the bed!” The German took her and shot her next to the fence. After the first shot, she was still alive, so he fired once again to finish her off.” (Witness n°490, interviewed in Samotrzask on August, 1st 2015).

Historical note

Samotrzask is located 79km  north-east of Warsaw. There is no precise information about the Jewish community living in the village before the war. According to a local resident interviewed by Yahad, there were several Jewish families in the village. They were artisans, like tailors, shoemakers or owned small shops. Supposedly, all the children, Jews and non-Jews, went to the Polish school.

Holocaust by bullets in figures

The village of Samotrzask was occupied by Germans in September 1939. As there is very little documented archival material, all the information that Yahad could gather was acquired during the field research. According to a local eyewitness, Yahad could identify the numerous mass graves of the Jews who were executed while attempting to jump out of the passing trains which transported the Jews to the Treblinka death camp. They were shot and buried on the spot. According to the field research, the local Jews were marked with armbands and were confined into a sort of ghetto composed of three buildings. They were either shot by bullets or deported to the Treblinka death camp.

 

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