1 Execution site(s)
Guenadi C.: "In winter, the Jews were undressed and shot on the edge of the pit in rows of 4-5 people. They fell into the pit. I saw the beginning of the shooting, but I ran away after the first shots." (Witness N°525 interviewed in June, 2011)
"The executioners gathered the whole Jewish population in a camp located on Oktiabr’skaia street in the city of Ushachi, the camp was surrounded by a double row of barbed wire, and the entrance closed off." [Act of the Soviet Extraordinary State Commission, RG-22.002M/7021-92/220]
Ushachy is a small town located 101 km west of Vitebsk. In 1939, 487 Jews lived in the town, making up 23.8% of the total population. The city was under German occupation from 1941 to 1944.
A ghetto fenced in with barbed wire was established in Ushachi in October 1941 on km Street. In January 1942, the Nazis resettled Jews from nearby Usaia, 29 kilometers east of Ushachy, and from the Kublichi ghetto 18 km to the west. The Ushachy Jews in the ghetto were murdered on January 12, 1942, in pits dug in advance by local residents near the orthodox cemetery. Before the liquidation, some Jews managed to set fire to the ghetto and escape. Some days later, the Jews of Kublichi were killed in the same pits where Ushachy Jews had been killed.
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