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1 Sitio(s) de ejecución
Zofia S., born in 1927: "About 1,000 people worked on the construction of the Łabunie airfield. They were housed in the Zamość camp. I lived nearby and saw them being taken to work by truck—every morning at 6:00 a.m. and returning around 7:00 p.m. The workers included men and women, Jews and Poles. A barrack was built at the Łabunie site to house Czech Jews. The Jews wore white armbands with a yellow Star of David. Their job included collecting stones and digging fuel tanks for the planes. The Germans supervised the work. Some Poles volunteered to serve as armed guards—they wore black uniforms and were paid a salary. Jews who lived on the airfield were shot on the spot. People weren’t allowed to come close, but it was known that the Germans were carrying out shootings, and the guards kept strict watch. One of the guards even killed a young Jewish child. A pit was dug on the left side of the airfield. I didn’t see it myself, but my father did. He saw Jews being shot and lying on the ground. As for me, I heard gunshots—pistol fire. The shooting went on all day.” [Testimony N°YIU118P, interviewed in Łabunie, on August 9, 2012]
"In 1940, a Czechoslovakian company came to Łabunie to build an airport and barracks. […] The construction of the airport and barracks at the airport was named "Łabunie No. 1". The other building structures, called "Łabunie No. 2", were located next to the former sawmill on the southern side of the road from Zamość to Tomaszów. […] The day before the camp was liquidated, Czech employees of the company responsible for constructing the airport ordered workers to dig a large hole near the former barracks. The next day, at around 9 am, all the Jews were ordered to gather at the former sawmill with their wives, children, and belongings. A German from the SS gave a speech. Then, one by one, all the Jews went to the kitchen, where they were stripped down to their underwear. Some children were completely naked; others wore undershirts. The Germans took their clothes and all their valuables and even tore gold teeth out of their mouths. I saw faces covered in blood, and at first, I thought they had been beaten. However, it turned out that their gold teeth had been ripped out just before their execution.
I watched this and the execution itself from 10 to 15 meters away. I was hiding in a garage. The pit was located a few meters from the kitchen. The prisoners came out of the kitchen in small groups and were shot in the back of the head by one of the Germans. Initially, they entered the pit down the ladder. As more people were murdered, the ladder was pulled out. Later, as the victims approached, the same German shot them in the back of the head and they fell into the pit. The German was drunk; he stumbled and didn’t always kill the victims right away. Then, he ordered someone who was waiting to be executed to go down into the pit and arrange the bodies so that one would lie on top of another. Prisoners with their families—husbands, wives, and children—left the kitchen for the execution site. It’s difficult to say how many women or children died; I only counted the number of people. When I counted to 82, a Jewish woman, about 30 years old, came to the pit with a small child in her arms. She said something to the executioner; apparently, she was asking for mercy for the child. I didn’t hear what he said to her. He kicked her, took the baby forcefully from her, and shot her in the head. She fell into the pit. Then, he dropped the baby and fired again. The child fell onto the other bodies. I don’t know if the baby was alive or if the German had hit it with his shot. I was so shocked that I left my hiding place and ran home. I don’t know how many prisoners were murdered. The execution lasted from around 10 a.m. to around 2 p.m. I know the Germans who carried out the execution ordered the bodies to be covered with lime and then earth. This is how the labor camp for the Jewish population in Łabunie No. 2 was liquidated." [Testimony of Kazimierz Sluma, born in 1918, compiled on July 9, 1968 in Zamość; IPN-OKL 244/Dz/68 pp. 272-274]
"On the day of the execution, at 7 a.m., I left the Łabunie buildings for the road to Zamość. The execution of the Jews had already begun, so a guard from the battalion asked me to stop. I had to collect the ration boxes near the barracks, which were near the execution site. I watched the Jews leave their barracks in columns and head for the pit for a moment. They approached the edge of the pit one by one, where three Gestapo officials carried out the executions by firing a pistol bullet into the back of each Jew's head. The Jews approached the scene of the massacre calmly. When I returned from Zamość with the rations at around 3 p.m., the execution was already over, and the pit was covered with earth. Most of the Jews were men. Jewish women and a few children under 8 years old made up about a quarter of the group. All of these Jews were executed. A local Jewish family consisting of two parents and their 14-year-old son lived in Łabunie. Their apartment adjoined the wall of a barracks occupied by Czech Jews. During the execution of the Czech Jews, the local Jewish family was also killed." [Testimony of Stanislaw Adamowicz, born in 1896, compiled on July 7, 1970 in Zamość; IPN-OKL DS1/00/Zn p.7-8]
Łabunie is a village in Zamość County, Lublin Voivodeship, in southeastern Poland. It lies approximately 10 km (6 miles) southeast of Zamość and 86 km (53 miles) southeast of the regional capital, Lublin.
The village dates back to the 15th century and developed over the centuries as part of estates owned by various noble families. In the 19th century, Count Aleksander Szeptycki acquired the estate, which included an 18th-century palace originally built by the Zamoyski family. Szeptycki played a significant role in the economic and cultural development of the village. By 1929, he owned a large tract of land, along with a mill, a steam-powered sawmill, and a distillery. The Szeptycki family managed the estate until the outbreak of the Second World War.
Little is known about the Jewish population of Łabunie itself. According to a local witness, two Jewish families lived in the village before the war. One was involved in trade, while the other lived and worked at the local sawmill. The center of Jewish life in the region was the nearby town of Zamość.
Following the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939, Łabunie and the entire Zamość district witnessed fighting between Polish forces and the advancing German army. The Germans occupied the area in mid-September but withdrew at the end of the month in favor of the Red Army. On October 7, 1939, the Soviets retreated to the newly established border, leaving the territory under full German control.
The Germans established a post in the Zamoyski palace and began construction of a military airfield on the Łabunie estate. The Czechoslovak company "Skala-Smolka i Wawreczka" was commissioned to build wooden barracks for the German army and oversee the airfield’s construction. Work began in the spring of 1941 and continued for about two years. Several hundred Jews from Poland and other countries, along with local Poles, were forced to work on the barracks and the runway.
According to local witnesses, nearly 1,000 laborers—including Polish villagers from the Zamość region and Jews from the Zamość and Komarów ghettos—were brought to the construction site by truck each morning for 12-hour shifts. The local Jews returned to their respective ghettos each evening, while foreign Jews, primarily from Czechoslovakia, were imprisoned in a nearby camp known as "Łabunie No. 2," located near a former sawmill. Barracks were built specifically to house them.
The Jewish workers endured brutal conditions: exhausting labor, food shortages, and constant violence. According to a local resident of Komarów, requisitioned to dig a pit in the Jewish cemetery there, a group of Jews was transported by truck from the Łabunie construction site and shot at that location, their bodies buried in the pit.
On the eve of the camp’s liquidation—carried out on November 5 or 6, 1943—the prisoners were forced to dig a large pit near the barracks. The next morning, around 9:00 a.m., all Jewish prisoners—men, women, and children—were assembled. After a speech by a German SS officer, they were stripped of their belongings and valuables, including gold teeth, and sent in small groups to be executed. Victims were shot in the back of the head, often falling alive into the pit. The German executioner, reportedly intoxicated, sometimes ordered prisoners to enter the pit and arrange the corpses before being shot themselves.
The massacre continued until mid-afternoon. The pit was then covered with earth and lime. A local Jewish family living at the sawmill near the barracks was killed alongside the Czech Jewish prisoners. Two witnesses interviewed by Yahad recalled that the victims were killed one by one, each shot with a pistol.
The site of the massacre, now located in a privately owned field near residential homes, remains unmarked and without commemoration.
According to Polish archival records and other historical sources, the number of Jewish victims murdered in the Łabunie camp is estimated at between 200 and 240.
For more information about the killing of Jews from the Łabunie No. 2 camp at the Komarów Jewish cemetery, please refer to the corresponding profile.
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