The local authorities ordered those Jews who were staying in the Caucasian villages to present themselves at assembly points, which were mainly in public buildings, such as schools91 or Kommandaturen posts.92 The Germans only rarely used enforcement measures, mostly to ensure that the Jews did not try to evade the order to assemble.93 After the assembly, Jews were isolated for some time and then marched out to be murdered—usually in the immediate vicinity of the village.94 Jewish women were sometimes raped during the killing operations.95 On the whole, during the Holocaust in rural Caucasian areas, the small German forces carried out this final stage of the annihilation of the Jews quite smoothly, as compared to the previous stages.
Jews were murdered in the Caucasian villages throughout the whole period of the German occupation of the region. In September and October 1942, hundreds of Jews were murdered, and the bulk of the rural Jewish population was destroyed. The pace of annihilation decreased in November, but in December 1942 the North Caucasian villages were swept by a new wave of killings. As in the towns, it consisted of last-minute mopping-up actions in the whole region (on the eve of the possible German withdrawal from the Caucasus), and the “cleansing” of all undesirable elements, including Jews. Remnants of the legally registered Jewish population, such as inmates of camps96 and those detected as a result of intensified searches, were killed during the German retreat from the region in January 1943.97
1 This chapter is a summary of my research on the Holocaust in the North Caucasus, as reflected in my book The Holocaust in the Crimea, 173–230.
2 Essentuki, Kislovodsk, Krasnodar. Statement of the Commission of the Town of Essentuki, July 10, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/4, p. 1. V. Karl, “The destruction of the Caucasian Jewry (descriptions of the Soviet writer Alexey Tolstoy following the eyewitnesses’ testimonies of the anti-Jewish atrocities),” Ha-tsofe, no. 1842, January 26, 1944 [Hebrew]. Questioning of Nikolai Poznansky, January 10, 1944, GARF: 7021/16/462, p. 205.
3 Statement of the Commission of the Town of Cherkessk, July 13, 1943, GARF: 702/17/12, pp. 68–69. Memorandum of the Command of Krasnodar Group [kust] of Partisan Detachments, October 1942 (?). In Beliaev and Bondar′, Kuban′ v gody Velikoi Otechestvennoi voiny, 557.
4 Report of Abram Nankin, in Chernaia kniga o zlodeiskom povsemestnom ubiistve evreev nemetsko-fashistskimi zakhvatchikami vo vremenno-okkupirovannykh raionakh Sovetskogo Soiuza i v lageriakh unichtozheniia Pol′shi vo vremia voiny 1941–1945 gg., ed. Vasilii Grossman and Il′ia Erenburg (Jerusalem: Tarbut, 1980), 272–273.
5 Questioning of Poznansky, GARF: 7021/16/462, p. 205.
6 Statement of the Commission of the Town of Novorossiisk, October 18, 1943, GARF: 7021/16/11, p. 1.
7 Essentuki, Krasnodar. Statement of the Commission of the Town of Essentuki, July 10, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/4, p. 1. Statement of Anna Sokolitskaya-Vasser, January 11, 1944, GARF: 7021/16/462, p. 204.
8 Statement of the Commission of the Town of Cherkessk, July 13, 1943, GARF: 702/17/12, pp. 68–69. Statement of the Commission of the Town of Pyatigorsk, GARF: 7021/17/3, p. 8.
9 Kislovodsk, Pyatigorsk. Statement of the Commission of the Town of Kislovodsk, June 21, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/5, p. 39. Statement of the Commission of the Town of Pyatigorsk, GARF: 7021/17/3, p. 8.
10 Krasnodar. NKVD Administration, Intelligence survey no. 21, October 6, 1942. In Beliaev and Bondar′, Kuban′ v gody Velikoi Otechestvennoi voiny, 461.
11 Elista, Zheleznovodsk. Report of the ESC, GARF: 7021/8/26, pp. 10–11. Statement of the Commission of the town of Zheleznovodsk, July 12, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/6, p. 1.
12 Cherkessk, Elista. Statement of the Commission of the Town of Cherkessk, July 13, 1943, GARF: 702/17/12, pp. 68–69. Report of the ESC, GARF: 7021/8/26, pp. 10–11.
13 Mikoyanshakhar—First ghetto, Zheleznovodsk. Statement of the Commission of the town of Mikoyanshakhar, June 20, 1943. GARF: 7021/17/10, p. 195. Statement of Kairov, GARF: 7021/17/6, p. 4.
14 Statement of the Commission of the Town of Mikoyanshakhar, June 20, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/10, p. 195.
15 Elista, Mikoyanshakhar, Zheleznovodsk. Report of the ESC, GARF: 7021/8/26, pp. 10–11. Statement of the Commission of the Town of Mikoyanshakhar, June 20, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/10, pp. 195–196. Statement of the Commission of the Town of Zheleznovodsk, July 12, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/6, pp. 1–2.
16 Statement of the Commission of the Town of Cherkessk, July 13, 1943, GARF: 702/17/12, pp. 68–69. Report of the ESC, GARF: 7021/8/26, pp. 10–11. Statement of the Commission of the Town of Mikoyanshakhar, June 20, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/10, p. 196. Statement of Kairov, GARF: 7021/17/6, p. 4.
17 Krasnodar, Novorossiisk. In Krasnodar, the registration of the whole population took place in September 1942, that is, more than two weeks after the registration and destruction of the Jews. NKVD Administration, Intelligence survey no. 6. In Beliaev and Bondar′, Kuban′ v gody Velikoi Otechestvennoi voiny, 460–461.
18 Cherkessk, Stavropol. Landesgericht München I, Urteil gegen Johannes Schlupper, Heinrich Winterstein, Rudi Eschenbach, July 24, 1974, YVA: TR.10/956, pp. 34–35. Document of the Stavropol medical institute, July 2, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/294, p. 7.
19 Essentuki, Mineralnye vody. Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee [based on letters from the local inhabitants], “Caucasian Jews Crying Out,” Ha-tsofe (Tel Aviv), no. 1702, August 4, 1943 [Hebrew]. Statement of Matvei Makogonenko, August 13, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/2, pp. 14–15.
20 Cherkessk, Stavropol. Statement of the Commission of the Town of Cherkessk, July 13, 1943, GARF: 702/17/12, pp. 68–69. Statement of the Commission of the City of Stavropol, July 11, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/1, pp. 95–96.
21 Elista, Krasnodar. Report of the ESC on the atrocities of the German Fascist occupiers in the occupied ulusy and the town of Elista, no later than September 10, 1943, GARF: 7021/8/26, pp. 10–11. Statement of the Commission of the City of Krasnodar, June 30, 1943, GARF: 7021/16/5, p. 12.
22 Kislovodsk, Mineralnye vody. Testimony of Sklyar, YVA: 0.3/3934, p. 6. “How the Jews Are Murdered,” Ha-tsofe, April 8, 1943 [Hebrew].
23 Testimony of Ya. Talyansky, no date, GARF: 7021/17/4, p. 31.
24 Kislovodsk. Testimony of Sklyar, YVA: 0.3/3934, p. 6.
25 Armavir, Zheleznovodsk. Statement of the Commission of the Town of Armavir, January 28, 1943, Tsentral′nyi arkhiv Ministerstva Oborony Rossiiskoi Federatsii (henceforth TsAMO RF): 51/958/52, pp. 91–92. Courtesy of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (henceforth USHMM). Statement of the Commission of the Town of Zheleznovodsk, July 12, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/6, p. 1.
26 Kislovodsk, Mineralnye vody. Testimony of Sklyar, YVA: 0.3/3934, p. 6. Statement of Pavlov, GARF: 7021/17/2, p. 13.
27 Essentuki and Krasnodar (?). Testimony of Belenkov, GARF: 7021/17/4, p. 24. Testimony of Krechetovich, YVA: 0.33.C/5961.
28 Cherkessk, Mikoyanshakhar. Statement on the atrocities and abuse committed by the German Fascist occupiers towards the peaceful population of Pregradnensky raion, June 28, 1943. In Stavropol’e v Velikoi Otechestvennoi voine 1941–1945 gg. Sbornik dokumentov i materialov (Stavropol: Knizhnoe izdatel′stvo, 1962), 135. Testimony of Nikeeva, GARF: 7021/17/10, p. 204.
29 For apartments, see Essentuki. Testimony of Faina Gulyanskaya, July 2, 1943, GARF: 7021/17/4, p. 17. For detention centers, see Statement of the Commission of the Town of Cherkessk. July 13, 1943, GARF: 702/17/12, pp. 68–69. Statement on the resort Teberda, GARF: 7021/17/7, pp. 4–5.
30 For the public, see Mikoyanshakhar. Testimony of Nikeeva, GARF: 7021/17/10, p. 204. For forced labor, see Essentuki. Testimony of Belenkov, GARF: 7021/17/4, p. 23. Statement of the