Tag #118190 - Interview #87371 (Fani Cojocariu)

A funeral took place here, in Dorohoi, in 1940. A Jewish soldier who was killed during World War II was brought from Herta [today Gertsa, the region of Chernivtsi] to Dorohoi to be buried in the Jewish cemetery. Herta is now located in Ukraine, in the territories occupied by the Russians, by the Ukrainians, but it wasn’t occupied at that time, it belonged to Romania. And among those who attended the funeral were both old and young, there were people of various ages, and a company of soldiers came to salute the Jewish soldier. And what do you think happened? The army was retreating from the war in those days [from the front], they passed through Dorohoi, and I don’t know how it happened, they started shooting, and they shot all those who were attending the funeral. The uncle I was telling you about was shot there as well, for he had attended the funeral himself. [Ed. note: At the end of June 1940, the Herta country from the county of Dorohoi was occupied by the Soviet Union, the city and the rest of the the county of Dorohoi becoming a corridor for the retreat of Romanian troops, on which occasion some Romanian military units carried out murders and robbery against the Jewish population. For instance, the anti-Jewish pogrom of July 1, 1940 in the city of Dorohoi.