To Bershad’ District Prosecutor,

Counselor of Justice

Comrade Chizhevsky P.A.

From citizen Arkady Petrovich Vayner, born in 1927, member of CPSU, resident of Bershad’, street of 50 years of the Komsomol, apt.10, working as the head of Bershad’ interdistrict management of gas facilities.

 Explanation:

In essence, I explain that I was born on April 22, 1927 in the village of Manivtsy of Krasilov district of Khmelnitsky region, where I lived with my parents until the beginning of the Great Patriotic War. Approximately on June 28-29, 1941, the village of Manivtsy was occupied by the German invaders. At the time, I was in 7th grade. All through 1941 my parents and I lived in Manivtsy. In 1942, our entire family was moved by the occupants to the ghetto, which was located in the village of Kul'chiny of Krasilov district. In May 1942, all of the ghetto residents, male and female, between the ages of 12 to 35 years, were moved to the village of Gorlyntsy [Orlintsy] of Antonin district of Khmelnitsky region, where we were placed into stables and pigsties. All of these premises were surrounded by barbed wire. They fed us badly - red fodder beets and pea waste soup. Every day, many of us died of starvation and typhus; ill people were often shot by the Germans. All people contained inside the camp were involved in heavy physical labor for the extraction, loading, and transportation of rubble stone. My peers and I were brought here to work. Those who fell down exhausted by the excessive labor of carrying the wagon with stone were shot by the German guards and the Polizei. Two older sisters and a younger brother were moved with me from the ghetto of Kul’chiny to the camp of Gorlyntsy. At the end of the summer, I fled from Gorlyntsy with another boy to the ghetto in Kul'chiny where my parents and younger sister lived. Later, all those who fled from Gorlyntsy were brought back to Kul’chiny. When we were escaping from the camp in Kul'chiny, the Polizei was shooting at us. Afterwards, everyone from the camp of Gorlyntsy, under the pretext of building a highway, was moved to Manivtsy. From the ghetto of Kul’chiny they moved to Manivtsy all the Jews who did not have a profession, under the pretext of relocating to other places. For about a week, we went to work on constructing the road. Then they gathered 100 physically strong men and gave them shovels under the pretext of digging turf for the plant. Instead, they were actually digging holes in the forest for the future execution of Jews. The holes were dug for some two weeks. One day in late June 1942, at dawn, at about 5-6 AM, 5 or 6 trucks arrived with elevated side boards adapted for transportation of peat, and began to load the people into the truck. They actually jammed us into the truck, with those who got to the bottom, being pressed to death by those who were above us. My brother, sister, and I were in the next to last car. The Polizei rode in the corners of the trunk, and also in the cockpit. While the truck was moving downhill, I, knowing the layout of the terrain and the fact that we were going to be shot, and being at the top of the trunk near the rear end side, where a Polizei sat, I lifted myself and fell, along with the Polizei, from the car. I immediately started to run away to the right side of the road. Polizei from the trucks in the front and behind me were shooting at me. But I still managed to escape. By night I came to Kirill Fadeevich Pizhitsky, the former director of the Manivtsy seven-year school. There I found my father who had also fled. Pizhitsky gave me a certificate that I was an orphan from Koshelevo boarding school, and an ethnic Ukrainian. While in hiding, my father and I came to the farm "Noviki" in Starokonstantinovka, where I worked as a Ukrainian, and my father - as a Jew. On the same farm, captive Red Army soldiers worked. I waited at the farm until the arrival of the Red Army. In November 1944, I was drafted into the ranks of the army, where I served until 1951. By the way, during my stay at the farm, for stealing the Germans portfolio with documents (I stole it by direction of the farm manager Mudrov who lived in the village Svetlaya of Starokonstantinov district), three Germans escorted me at night to be shot, and I again, with a wounded arm, managed to escape from them to a field. I stayed at the farm at the apartment of Ivan Veshniov (I don’t remember his patronymic name), who was originally from the village Borkovka of Starokonstantinov district.

Explanation is recorded from my words, and I have read it. Recorded correctly.

(Signed)

True copy.

Acting Head of Department

Of Regional Prosecutor office

18.08.99 year V.P.Dzyubak

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[Note: CPSU – Communist Party of Soviet Union]