On the 29th January 1946 in front of a crowd of thousands inside of the Ukrainian City
of Kiev, 12 former members of the German police force were brought out to a huge set of gallows
which had been created for their executions. Each of the men were stood under it as executioners
then placed the noose around their necks. Their crime was being involved in one of the
most horrific mass murders and executions of the Second World War, in what was known
as Babi War, and for the Ukrainian people the reprisals of those German police members
being executed in the town square was justice for the slaughter that happened. As at Babi
yar, over 33,000 people were slaughtered in two deadly days in September 1941, but its
believed that at Babi Yar that between 100,000 and 150,000 people were killed and murdered
there during the German occupation. But what is the story of those German officers and
soldiers who were executed in front of the huge crowds in Kiev? Join us today as we find
out and to support our channel, please make sure to subscribe.
Babi Yar is a ravine which became a site of mass execution and slaughter during the Second
World War. The German forces would occupy Kiev on the 19th September 1941, and they
would cause chaos in the city. Over the next week, explosives planted by the Soviet secret
police the NKVD would damage the city heavily, and explosions would go off near the German
headquarters. But then there was the decision made by the SS and police leader Friedrich
Jeckelen to exterminate the Jews of Kyiv in retaliation for the explosions. The commanders
of the Einsatzgruppe, the German death squads were party to this decision, and the mass
slaughter would be carried out by units commanded by Dr Otto Rasch the commander of Einsatzgruppe
C and also Paul Blobel. The roundup of the jews inside of Kyiv began, and they were ordered
to gather in specific areas around the city, and they were told to bring money, valuables
and documents with them as well as warm clothing and linen. They believed that they would be
deported or would be sent elsewhere. But the German occupiers then went further saying
any jew who did not follow this order and was found elsewhere in the city would be shot,
and that those civilians who would enter the houses of jews and stole items for themselves
would be shot.
It was then on the 29th and 30th September 1941 that the slaughter of 33,771 Jewish civilians
at Babi Yar began. The einsatzgruppe units would take control and would slaughter in
the ravine. One commander who oversaw the actions said, ‘The difficulties resulting
from such a large scale action—in particular concerning the seizure—were overcome in
Kiev by requesting the Jewish population through wall posters to move. Although only a participation
of approximately 5,000 to 6,000 Jews had been expected at first, more than 30,000 Jews arrived
who, until the very moment of their execution, still believed in their resettlement, thanks
to an extremely clever organization.’ But eyewitnesses would state of the horror of
the executions. One truck driver said that, ‘I watched what happened when the Jews—men,
women and children—arrived. The Ukrainians led them past a number of different places where
one after the other they had to give up their luggage, then their coats, shoes and over-garments
and also underwear. They also had to leave their valuables in a designated place. There
was a special pile for each article of clothing. It all happened very quickly and anyone who
hesitated was kicked or pushed by the Ukrainians to keep them moving.’
The victims did not know what was happening until it was too late, and they had no chance
to survive when they heard the fire of machine guns which were executing the others in front
of them. The victims were driven to walk down a corridor of armed German soldiers in groups
of ten and they were then shocked. It was said, ‘Once undressed, they were led into
the ravine which was about 150 metres long and 30 metres wide and a good 15 metres deep ...
When they reached the bottom of the ravine they were seized by members of the Schutzpolizei and
made to lie down on top of Jews who had already been shot ... The corpses were literally
in layers. A police marksman came along and shot each Jew in the neck with a submachine
gun I saw these marksmen stand on layers of corpses and shoot one after the other ...
The marksman would walk across the bodies of the executed Jews to the next Jew, who
had meanwhile lain down, and shoot him.’
Following these first massacres, the Germans undermined the walls of the ravine and buried
the people under layers of dirt, and they recorded the exact number executed as 33,771.
The valuables and money and belongings of those slaughtered were then given to local
ethnic germans and to the Nazi government in the city. Those who were just wounded were
also buried alive. But in the months after, thousands more were sent to Babi Yar where
they were executed, and it’s estimated that over 100,000 residents of Kyiv were slaughtered
there, and a concentration camp was even set up nearby.
Shockingly some of the Nazis who had been involved in the massacre were proud of their
actions as it was said of Paul Blobel that, ‘"we were driving past a long ravine. I
noticed strange movements of the earth. Clumps of earth rose into the air as if by their
own propulsion—and there was smoke; it was like a low-toned volcano; as if there was
burning lava just beneath the earth. Blobel laughed, made a gesture with his arm pointing
back along the road and ahead, all along the ravine—the ravine of Babi Yar—and said,
'Here lie my thirty-thousand Jews.'" But at the end of the Second World War, a number
of SS commanders who had planned and overseen the massacre were placed on trial. Paul Blobel
was executed at Landsberg Prison for his involvement in other massacres too, and Otto Rasch would
die in prison in 1947. Friedrich Jeckeln would also be hanged in February 1946, but over
time the hunt was on to arrest those who had been involved also in the executions.
One German who was brought to trial, Boris Drachenfels but was not executed would explain
the horror of the Babi yar massacre and he said, ‘Screams of thousands of people were
heard from far away.... They stood surrounded by many policemen and awaited their fate....
The policemen drove groups of people to the ditches, where they undressed. Special SD
details and the policemen of our battalion shot them at the nape of the neck. Adults
were forced to lie down in the ditches and were shot, while children were torn away from
their mothers and shot. Most of the shooters were drunk... People begged for mercy, mothers
begged us to spare their children.’ He would be sentenced to 15 years hard labour, as he
was employed as a lookout and not a shooter. But then in January 1946 15 former members
of the German police were brought to trial inKyiv for their role in the massacres and
other crimes committed during the Second World War. The courtrooms heard a significant amount
of evidence including the testimony of those who witnessed it, and of the 15 brought to
trial, 12 of them were sentenced to death. These were Fritz Beckenhof, Karl Burchhardt,
Georg Heinisch, Wilhelm Hellerforth, Hans Isenmann, Emil Jogschat, Emil Knoll, Willi
Meier, Paul von Scheer, Eckart Hans von Tschammer und Osten, Georg Truckenbrod, and Oskar Walliser.
Each of these men it’s said had been involved in the killing process, and these were the
men who were executed on the 29th January 1946 in the town square in Kyiv.
Those who had been sentenced to death were brought out in the town square in front of
a huge crowd. The crowds were looking on from the hills above, and thousands had attended
to watch the proceedings. A large gallows structure capable of hanging many people at
one time had been made, and the men were brought to the execution structure on the backs of
trucks. The men were then driven under the gallows, and on the wooden beams were many
different nooses which had been tied to execute the men. Soviet officials and executioners
then secured the nooses around the necks of the former German officers, and then the death
sentence was read by an official. He said, ‘For the brutal destruction of peaceful
Soviet citizens and prisoners of war. For the destruction of cities and villages.
For the enslavement of the population of Soviet Ukraine. Guided by Article 2 of the Criminal
Code of the Ukraine SSR and Articles 296 and 297 of the Criminal Procedure Code of the
Ukraine SSR. The military tribunal sentenced Cher, Burkhardt, Shammer and Austen Heinisch,
Walliser, Truckenbrod, Gellerfort, Knol, Beckenroff, Isenmann, Yogshat to death by hanging.
Comrade Commandant, enforce the sentence!” After this the trucks drove off and the 12
were then left hanging and they strangled to death as the thousands of witnesses looked
on.
The executions of the 12 former German police members who partook in the horrors of Babi
Yar were deemed reprisals for the slaughter of dozens of thousands of people from Kyiv
during the Second World War. Inside the town square in Kyiv they met their end as thousands
looked on.
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