The jews of bessarabia the holocaust period

 

 

The first group went north through Cramenia, Gora-Kamenka, Soroka, Coshautsi.  The 

second group was directed east through Tamlautsi, Vashkauts, Koshmirka, Mateusz, 

Rezina.  It was only on October 10 – after 25 days- that the first groups arrived at the 

Dniester and crossed it at Rabnitza.  From there they were sent to the ghetto in 

Grozovska in Transnistria.   

The conditions of this death march were horrible.  It was decided in advance that the 

evacuees had to travel 30 km per day.  This was after two months of starvation and 

suffering in the Vertujeni camp where they had to do hard labor.  About 50 Jews died 

every day in this camp. 

The caravans had 1600 people – 800 per direction.  Instead of the 50 wagons required 

to transport baggage and the sick, there were hardly 4-8 wagons.  They had been 

hired by the evacuees themselves.  Many families were separated since every group 

was sent in a different direction.  Many of them were never reunited.  Thousands of 

evacuees died on the road.  Their escorts robbed them.  Those who had better clothes 

were shot by the gendarmes who sold the clothes to the peasants.  The miserable 

evacuees had to trade a watch, a gold ring or another valuable item for a cup of water.  

The evacuation from Vertujeni ended on October 8, 1941. 

On October 2 the evacuation of 10,356 Jews from Secureni began.  This also had two 

directions and caused the separation of families.  Before they left the Jews were 

searched and finally they had nothing left.  On October 5 the second group left 

Secureni. 

On October 4 the evacuation from Kishinev began.  The first group of 1,600 went 

towards the Dniester through Orgeyev and Rezina.  In Kishinev it was easy to see how 

worthless the orders of the Romanians were.  The Vice-premier of Romanian ordered, 

after intervention by Dr. Fielderman to stop the evacuation, to do a selection and to 

keep out of the group evacuated the intellectuals, merchants, craftsmen and owners of 

urban or rural property.  This order was not followed and the evacuation included the 

entire Jewish population. 

The groups from Edinets left on October 11-12 and included 11,762 evacuees.  Before 

they crossed the Dniester they were placed in a camp in Markolesht which had been 

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erected early in October.  The camp commander terrorised the evacuees and many of 

them were killed after being hit and abused.  The camp existed until November 10. 

The number of victims on the road will never be known.  People died of exhaustion or 

they were killed while being robbed.  The number of those who perished in Markolesht 

or those who drowned in the Dniester on the way to Transnistria or to the ghettos will 

also remain a secret. 

Only a total of 55,867 Jews arrived in Transnistria from Bessarabia of the 80, 000 who 

had been alive during the first wave of massacres when the German-Romanian armies 

entered the area between the Prut and the Dniester.  The difference between the two 

totals represents the number of victims who died in various ways on the way to 

Transnistria, when being returned by the Germans or during the final evacuation.  Until 

the end of summer 1943, 61% of the evacuees died in Transnistria according to a 

report given by Dr. Fielderman to the Romanian government upon his return from exile 

in Transnistria.  These numbers are also found in a secret report by the police in 1943.  

From that report it seems the total number of evacuees was 11,033 and of those 

50,741 died. 

We know about what occurred in Transnistria from various sources, but it is impossible 

to separate the Jews of Bessarabia from the rest of the victims.  There were many 

evacuees from other areas in the camps and the ghettos. 

POLITICAL STRUGGLE TO SAVE THE JEWS OF BESSARABIA 

News about events in Bessarabia barely reached Bucharest where there was one group 

representing the Jews – the union of Jewish communities.  The difficulty in sending the 

news was as a result of lack of proper transportation especially for Jews who were not 

permitted to go from place to another.  There was no way to escape from Bessarabia to 

old Romania.  The first fragmented reports arrived in mid-August.  It was then that it 

was discovered that Jews were being locked up in ghettos and camps.  Sources of 

information were the Romanian soldiers and officers who arrived in the capital on 

vacation or for their jobs.  Soon news came from Bukovina about the Jews being 

evacuated to Bessarabia.  They were able to communicate with Jews from Czernowitz 

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who had not yet been evacuated.  In Bukovina there were reports that somehow made 

their way to Bucharest. 

The first appeal by the union of Jewish communities in Bucharest dealt only with 

getting permission to send parcels to the evacuees.  The seriousness of the situation 

was discovered only later with the news of the massacres and the evacuations from 

Bessarabia.  The first appeal by Dr. Fielderman, the chairman of the union of 

communities, came on October 9.  Dr. Fielderman sent an official letter to Antonescu 

asking him to stop the evacuations.  Two days later, on October 11, Dr. Fielderman 

sent a second letter to Antonescu in which he described the dire situation of the Jews 

of Kishinev as he had heard it.  He begged him to do something for the evacuated 

Jews.  His reply is mentioned above. 

In spite of this the Jewish leaders did not give up.  On October 14, 1941 Dr. Fielderman 

managed to get a meeting with the vice-premier, Mikhai Antonescu, He received from 

him a promise to stop evacuations from Bukovina and Bessarabia of the intellectuals, 

merchants, craftsmen and land owners.  There was now hope for a rescue.  Dr. 

Fielderman sent another letter to dictator Antonescu asking him to stop evacuations of 

all Jews and returning those who had been evicted from their homes.  He explained 

that two months earlier the Germans had brought back the groups that had been sent 

from Bessarabia to Transnistria.  Dr. Fielderman’s conclusion was that the Germans 

had returned some evacuees and therefore the act could not be considered to be 

against the state.  He added that among the evacuees there were Jews from Ragat who 

did not have a chance to return to their homes as well as veteran soldiers, war invalids 

and orphans. 

It is now known that Antonescu’s order to stop the evacuation was not heeded in 

Bessarabia where all the Jews were involved.  In addition, by the time the order from 

Bucharest arrived most of the evacuations had already taken place.  The evacuations 

were stopped in Bukovina and anyone still in Czernowitz on November 15, 1941 –

about 20,000 Jews – was saved.  However, the evacuation of Jews from villages and 

small towns continued.  On November 7 the Jews were evacuated from Dorohoi and 

surroundings since the town belonged to Bukovina. 

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