We are proud to announce
that with Yad Vashem's
permission, we have translations of some of Yad Vashem's testimonies
of survivors that relate to Lida District!
We are proud to announce that with the permission of the Jacob Rader
Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives, we have translations
of some survivor testimonies collected by the World Jewish Congress in
order to prosecute the perpetrators of war crimes in the Lida area.
There is much Yiddish material in these
files, which I cannot read. Anyone interested in cataloging this
material, please contact me.
Summary of the testimony of Nathan
Ballon, from Eisiskes, of a mass murder of 300 Jews in Voronovo.
Vladimir Barzach (formerly
Tenenbaum) on the fate of the Ardal factory; brief comment on how he
survived.
War crimes in Vasilishki from the report of the Soviet Extraordinary Commission,
translated by Aleksander Solts
War criminals in
Vasilishki from the report of the Soviet Extraordinary
Commission, translated by Aleksander Solts
List of victims from the report of the Soviet Extraordinary Commission,
translated by Aleksander Solts, Arthur Stiftel, and Dr. Frances
Dworecki
The Yad Vashem database
of Holocaust victims is now online. Check the home page.
Summary
of War Crimesproceedings for war crimes committed in Lida
District. Translated by Irene Newhouse, published with
permission of the Zentrale Stelle der Landesjustizverwaltungen.
From the Trial of Dr. Filbert &
al, war crimes in the Lida area committed by
the Einsatzgruppen. Translated
by Irene Newhouse, published with permission of the Zentrale Stelle
der Landesjustizverwaltungen.
Investigation
of Josef Kieferfor war crimes
committed in Ostryna and Szczuczyn. Translated
by Irene Newhouse, published with permission of the Zentrale Stelle
der Landesjustizverwaltungen.
The
fate of Ernst Schaffitz, convicted in Poland for war crimes
against Poles. Translated
by Irene Newhouse, published with permission of the Zentrale Stelle
der Landesjustizverwaltungen.
War Crimes Indictmentfor
crimes committed in Lida District by Leopold Windisch and Rudolf
Werner.. Translated by Irene Newhouse from Yad
Vashem document TR-10/646, published with permission of the Zentrale
Stelle der Landesjustizverwaltungen.
Indictment against Schulz-Isenbeck for participation
in the mass murder of about 90 Jewish men in
Lida on 7/5/1941Translated
by Irene Newhouse, published with permission of the Zentrale
Stelle der Landesjustizverwaltungen.
Pictureof the
memorial for the destroyed Communities in the Lida area at Yad Vashem,
courtesy of Danny Chejfic
Learn about World
War II in the area around and including Lida District from the Wiesenthal Center. They
keep reorganizing their web site, and they don't have a search engine.
So you'll have to do a general web search using the search terms
Holocaust and Lida.
The Ghetto Fighters'
House archives contain many pictures from Lida and
area towns, generally group photos. Use the "search by
text". There is also a partisan database that searches by name
only.
Log of SS
actions in Lithuania(Look specifically for Butrimonys and
Eisiskes - spelled Eysisky) Then click your browser's
"back" button to return here. Butrimonys is probably
the one in Lithuania between Alytus & Varena, though, not the one
in Lida District.
No one knows what happened to the Jews of Lida who survived
the 1941 mass killings & were deported
in September, 1943, because no one returned. Some
feel
they were sent to Sobibor.
Sobibor, however, was in the process of changing
function, and it's more probable they were sent to Majdanek.
Nazi estimates of Jews
murdered in Lida, from the Nuernberg (Nuremberg) Trials.
The thread is quite long, so use the "find in page" feature to find
the occurrence of "Lida".
Testimony
of A. Aviel, a man from near Radun, in the Adolf Eichmann
trial. Use the "find in page" feature of your browser to locate
the beginning of his testimony. His testimony
continued. There are a few concluding paragraphs in the next
session Click your browser's "back" button to return.
Testimony of Avraham
Karasik in the Eichmann trial. On page
3, he describes his forced activities in the Lida area.
List of
German officers in charge of occupied towns in Grodno district
includes some Lida towns
The partisan activities of Dr. Yehaskel
Atlas included blowing up the
Lida-Grodno railway line. The
Wiesenthal Center has information both on Dr. Atlas on the sabotage of
the Lida-Grodno railway. Due to frequent reorganizations, I cannot
maintain these links. Use a web search to find them, incorporating the
search term Wiesenthal.
The underground activities of Joseph Kaplan
included taking charge of an illegal
border-crossing point in Lida during September 1939 The Wiesenthal Center has information both on Kaplan and his activity. Due to frequent reorganizations, I cannot maintain these links.
Use a web search to find them, incorporating the search term Wiesenthal.
German Sergeant Anton Schmid
saved Jews in Vilnius, by, among other things, sending them to slightly
safer places in the Lida area. The Wiesenthal Center has information on Schmid and the Lida area. Due to frequent reorganizations, I cannot maintain these links.
Use a web search to find them, incorporating the search term Wiesenthal.
The partisan activities of the Bielski brothers. From the Wiesenthal Center. Due to frequent reorganizations, I cannot maintain these links.
Use a web search to find them, incorporating the search term Wiesenthal.
Lida is mentioned in Einsatzgruppen reports 13,
17
and 21
The Simon Wiesenthal Center's pages on the Holocaust in
Lida Due to frequent reorganizations, I cannot maintain these links.
Use a web search to find them, incorporating the search term Wiesenthal.
The Lida
Ghetto, also at the Wiesenthal Center site Due to frequent reorganizations, I cannot maintain these links.
Use a web search to find them, incorporating the search term Wiesenthal.
The Einsatzgruppen in Lithuania, with a picture of
girls from Eisiskes. If this link jumps back to a start page on Holocaust
education, click on topic 8, Mass Murder to see the picture.
Residents of some of the towns in the Lida area were forced to
Ozery
before they were murdered. From the Wiesenthal Center website. Due to frequent reorganizations, I cannot maintain these links.
Use a web search to find them, incorporating the search term Wiesenthal.
Lejzor
Stolicki, chief of Jewish Ghetto police, killed September 1943 From the Wiesenthal Center website. Due to frequent reorganizations, I cannot maintain these links.
Use a web search to find them, incorporating the search term Wiesenthal.
Portion of the diary
of a partisan that mentions Zhetl, Lida & the Bielskis can be found on the Yad Vashem web site. They reorganize their site periodically, so go to their home page & search within the site using diary, partisan & Lida in an "all the words" search.
Extract of an operations
log of a partisan unit that was active in the Lida &
other areas can be found on the Yad Vashem web site. They reorganize their site periodically, so go to their home page & search within the site using partisan & Lida in an "all the words" search.
The fascinating autobiography of Avram Aviel, a survivor
from Dogalishok, was taken offline in 2003. It has now been published
as a book: Village Named Dogalishok: The Massacre At Radun And Eishishok (Library of
Holocaust Testimonies) 2006. It can be ordered online from the large commercial online booksellers.
Another Jewish partisan leader active in the Nalibocki Forest
near Lida was Shalom
Zorin. The linked page has a picture of him in the right
column, quite a way down the page. There are also some pictures
of partisans in the Nalibocki Forest. From the Wiesenthal Center website. Due to frequent reorganizations, I cannot maintain these links.
Use a web search to find them, incorporating the search term Wiesenthal. Life in Zorin's group is
described in Jack and Rochelle by Jack & Rochelle Sutin;
see
the books page for the full reference.
The log of a
partisan unit in the Rudnicki Forest, 1943-4. Since the
target was the Grodno-Vilna Railroad, the unit moved into the Lida area
many times. This, too, should come up in a search of the Yad Vashem website. I recommend an "all the words" search for Rudnicki and partisan.
http://pawet.narod.ru/book/memory/nakaznysh.html
contains the story of a non-Jewish woman. Her father, a railroad
engineer, was an "enemy of the people" to the Soviets, so he was exiled
from Siberia to Lida, and his wife & daughter came with him. The
mother was arrested, they all worked with the partisans. She led
incredible life, filled with suffering, because they were "enemies of
the people" to the Soviets and denounced as "bolsheviks" to the Germans
by local Poles. The article also mentions names of people who helped
Jews and people who betrayed them. This English summary is by Lena
Gorina-Black. The links from
Lena Gorina-Black are to web pages in Russian. Some of them can be
translated online to something that's half-comprehensible, while others
don't display Cyrillic properly on my computer, though they obviously
did on hers. New 4/09
http://www.mishpoha.org/nomer16/a25.htm is the story of the Bielski partisans - Lena Gorina-Black.
http://ev-en.org/history/kurenetz_destruction_1.html describes the mass murder of 8,000 Jews from Lida - Lena Gorina-Black.
http://exhibition.brfvp.com/punitive_operations.htmis
an article on the Holocaust in Belarus. It says that 116,000 Jews in
the Lida region were murdered. - Lena Gorina-Black. (link went stale in
'09)
http://www.newsru.com/background/04may2005/memoryday.html says that some Jews from the Lida Ghetto were sent to Sobibor - Lena Gorina-Black
http://margolin-ze-ka.tripod.com/chapter02.html
is the memoir of a Polish Jew who spent decades in a Gulag. He as in
Lida in 1939, which he describes as cold, food shortages to the point
of starvation, and everyone was trying to get to Palestine. -Lena
Gorina-Black.
Lena
Gorina-Black also found a page somewhere with a history of the post
office in Lida. In 1940-41, about 18 workers were arrested and sent to
Siberia or Kazakhstan.
http://sb.by/post/80133/
contains an article on the Holocaust in Lida. However, the picture
doesn't seem to be that of the Lida Holocaust Memorials for which we
have pictures. If anyone can confirm that this monument is in Lida or
the area, please let me know.
The article cites a diary of Josepha Klaydenst, teacher at a Gymnasium,
to which there are no other web links, and which is said to give April
22, 1942 as the day of the mass murders in Lida. -summary by Lena
Gorina-Black.
Holocaust Dates in the Lida Area: 28 or 29 June 1941: Lida occupied by German troops.
About 80% of the city has been destroyed in the fighting. Jews
are forced to clear the rubble. May 8-12, 1942: Mass executions September 11-14, 1943: the Lida Ghetto is liquidated; no one
returned
