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In Sargorod [Shargorod] they put us in abandoned houses, with no roofs, destroyed by the battles on the front – for the front had been there once –, and that’s how we passed the winter, with no windows or roof.
We were around 4-5 families living together in a large room; we stayed on the floor, with straws scattered around in the dirt. Typhus broke out, along with lice – and these killed people by the thousands. You just saw it in the morning the following day… There were carts provided by the Town Hall of Sargorod [Shargorod] which carried the dead, the corpses. Just as they did in Dorohoi in the old days with the dogs they collected from the streets, which were thrown somewhere in a dried up well, that’s how they collected the corpses from the houses in Shargorod, and took them to the cemetery, and dumped them in a mass grave. My parents themselves are lying there, together with approximately over 200 dead bodies, dumped there. We arrived there in November, and they died during the first winter because of the filth and hunger, in January-February 1942. My mother was the first to die, followed shortly afterwards by my father.
The first winter [the winter of 1941-1942] was terrible. People died then by the thousands. Because of the typhus, the filth, the hunger… Where could one get food?
We were around 4-5 families living together in a large room; we stayed on the floor, with straws scattered around in the dirt. Typhus broke out, along with lice – and these killed people by the thousands. You just saw it in the morning the following day… There were carts provided by the Town Hall of Sargorod [Shargorod] which carried the dead, the corpses. Just as they did in Dorohoi in the old days with the dogs they collected from the streets, which were thrown somewhere in a dried up well, that’s how they collected the corpses from the houses in Shargorod, and took them to the cemetery, and dumped them in a mass grave. My parents themselves are lying there, together with approximately over 200 dead bodies, dumped there. We arrived there in November, and they died during the first winter because of the filth and hunger, in January-February 1942. My mother was the first to die, followed shortly afterwards by my father.
The first winter [the winter of 1941-1942] was terrible. People died then by the thousands. Because of the typhus, the filth, the hunger… Where could one get food?
Period
Location
Shargorod
Vinnytska oblast
Ukraine
Interview
Simon Meer