Contents

JewishGen Home Page

KehilaLinks Home Page

www.jewishgen.org/Ukraine/

Pokatilovo Jewish Community Oral History Research Project

This research project was conducted by Anatoliy and Maryna Mikhelson. They are very committed to research, discovery, and preservation of the Jewish History in Ukraine. They provided the impetus, the energy, and the initiative to build the Holocaust Memorial in the town of Novopoltavka.

When Anatoliy and Maryna heard of the KehilaLinks JewishGen project about Pokatilovo, they offered their invaluable trip to the "Lost Civilization of Pokatilovo" as they called it. It wasn't an easy trip. Between the many hurdles, they were able to find traces of the Jewish community that now exists only in memory. In resurrecting even the smallest shard of the Jewish history of the area, Anatoliy and Maryna pay tribute and deep respect to those who built then suffered and died in most horrible circumstances. This tribute is shared by the descendants of the Jewish community of Pokatilovo now spread to Argentina, America and throughout the world. Thank you Anatoliy and Maryna for stirring our collective memories of the sweet flow of the Yatran and providing the documentation to be shared by our descendants. Thank you for honoring those who fell into the nameless pit. We will never forget them!

The road to Pokatilovo

Broken clay pit,
where about 500 Jewish residents were shot in 1942

"Godforsaken place" is the name given by many of the current residents of this beautiful area. The more proper geographic description of the area is: The Village of Pokatilovo, Newarchangel area, Kirovograd region of Ukraine.

The history of the village goes back to the mid-18th century and during those 300 years many people and cultural layers have left their mark there. It is very difficult to search for any information about Pokatilovo that occurred prior to the mass emigration of its Jewish residents to Argentina and America at the beginning of the 20th century. During our short visit of a few days, we faced meaningful problems tracing the history of the area and the genealogy of descendants of former residents of Pokatilovo. For example, descendants of former residents of Pokotilovo, Sylvia Walowitz-Kozodoy and her father Elias, are actively researching their heritage in this area. Sarah Kozodoy, Sylvia's grandmother, was born in Pokatilovo in 1902.

We met Alexander Trigub, a resident of Pokatilovo, who was born in 1974. He is the Chairman, not only of Pokatilovo (500 people), but also of two other villages with a total population of roughly 1,500 people. He holds essentially all the power in this remote corner of the center of the Ukrainian land: all the infrastructure, communication, school, kindergarten, club, shops, medical center, cemetery and others. He conducts all orders, regulations, and directives of both central and local government. No significant events in the life of the village can occur without him, whether it is the celebration of national holidays, or a wedding, a birthday and, funerals. Three times he was elected to this position by an overwhelming majority. People see him as a real defender of their interests, although his capabilities are very limited. His salary is a little above the minimum in the Ukraine.

Alexander Trigub and Anatoliy Mikhelson (on right)

It should be said that hardly half of the working population really work. The people of Pokatilovo have their own small plots of land, which they received from the privatization after the collapse of the Soviet Union. But almost all the land is leased to the big agricultural producers who were organized by the former Communist Party and the Soviet government leaders. Thus there is poverty and despair among the majority of the villagers. Many of them do not work and drink alcohol thus barely making both ends meet in this situation. They don't produce anything because of the lack of money and materials. They live by leasing their plots of land. All machinery is in the hands of the oligarchs.They collect pennies for cheaper milk, sending it to the refineries.

However, we met with an enthusiast person, striving not only to change the situation, but also to learn the history of his native village. He knows that the glorious history of the village derived from the Jews who had build up a town far away from the highways. The town was called Pokatilovo. It had three synagogues, schools, hospitals, pharmacies, 24 shops, a large mill which was driven by a water turbine that ran on the small and beautiful river, the "Yatran". The school has been restored thanks to the efforts of the young Chairman Alexander Trigub and an oligarch’s money. This oligarch is a deputy of the Ukrainian Parlament. The school is reputed to be the best in the area. Now, apart from the school, all this is now only abandoned buildings and a derelict mill, an old bridge, near to the new bridge and the old Jewish Cemetery. That cemetery is 200 meters from the last street.

Unfortunately, or misfortune (in my opinion) for local residents, the Cemetery has deteriorated from mischief and is overgrown with grass and thick prickly thorns. We were able to find there only fragments of the traditional stone tombs in the form of a tree trunk with branches chopped off with barely legible words of Yiddish or Hebrew. That's all the remnants that exist on this earth from more than 200 years of Jewish civilization.

That Jewish civilization had disappeared. What are the reasons for it demise? It's no secret that relations between the local population and the Jews were less than ideal. Even during the "Koliivshchina", the so called peasant uprising against the Poles in the middle of the 17th century, the Poles and the Jews suffered. By some estimates up to 100,000 Jewish lives were lost in the Ukraine amidst the looting and violence by the forces of Bohdan Khmelnytsky and other small and large Hetman chieftains during their "liberation" in the war against Poland. Naturally, the Jews had no military forces and were only a source of plunder and profit.

After the partition of Poland, The Tsarist government took Polish lands and greatly increased its population in the area. They were up to 1.5 million Ashkenazi Jews. The "Laws of the Pale of Settlement" forbade Jews to live in big cities. A special way of life formed in small towns and villages. The Jewish villages (Shtetls) comprised Jewish craftsmen, artisans, milkmen, tailor, sellers, a rabbi, a teacher, a doctor, a pharmacist. We heard about it from our grandparents and read the stories of Shalom Aleichem in our childhood. It was their ghetto with their own culture which the non-Jewish residents called "alien", i.e. "not ours." However, these cultures coexisted through the amazing ability of Jews to adapt to any conditions, even the most hostile. And besides, these cultures have influenced each other and created many beautiful works of art, music, dance, and literature. The ancient Jewish civilization created the foundation for the future of European civilization and Christianity which were founded upon the moral values of the Jewish Torah.

There were severe trials endured by the people in the period before and after the revolutions. In the early 20th century, after a series of pogroms, the Jews began mass emigration from Ukraine to America and Argentina. This process did not escape our Pokatilovo. The grandmother of Sylvia and her family were part of the emigration to Argentina. They were part of the community created there from former Pokatilovo residents. Chairman Alexander Trigub said, "The most intelligent and sensible, who made the history of Pokatilovo, left". Then, the Soviet government followed with its debunking of ideals and religion, expropriating land and creating the image of the communist Jew. Thus they denied all the Jewish ancient history and traditions".

Trigub continued saying: I don't want to offend those who stayed, but their life was tragic. Almost all of them were killed during the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question" by German Nazis and their helpers many of whom were active Ukrainian nationalists.This was a tragic page in the life of Pokatilovo. Considering that in all the villages, colonies, cities and towns, the Jewish population of Ukraine was about about 2.5 million souls. These events are not adequately reflected in the documents and in the history of the village. Almost no one knows what precisely happened in the village during the war. We do know that 85% of the population was Jewish before that Holocaust.

A monument to "victims of the Soviet people against the German fascist "was erected by those who survived. However the word "Jew" was shamefully hidden under the monument. Then it fell into neglect, collapsed, and was overgrown with grass. Young people of the village had been ignorant and indifferent to the fate of their village and its history. But now, they started to listen to family descendants of those shot and killed during that horrible period. We are grateful that Ida Sanilevich Stepanova and her husband provided the resources and their dedication to the restoration of the monument. It is sad that the dead villagers were not buried according to Jewish tradition and worse that their exact place of burial is not known. Thank God, there are people in this environment that genuinely want to start to change life by changing the mentality of the people by spiritual purification and repentance. It is beyond horrible to know that about 70 local residents, some from neighboring villages, and the police took part in the executions. Police from Pokotilovo went through the village shootings their Jewish neighbors. The killers and their victims had played together as children in a sandbox.Yes, it’s a long way until repentance!

The Memorial to the victims of the fascism. It was built in the 1970s on the site to commemorate all the Jewish people killed in February 15, 1942. It was restored in 2006 in memory of all the people killed, not just the Jewish people.

The news that Jews from America were coming to learn the story quickly passed through the village. We managed to meet the only survivor of one of the firing squads, Boris Bilomlinsky. He was born 8 months after the shooting. His mother was Ukrainian. She then stood at the edge of the ravine before the execution and begged the killers to let her go because she was Ukrainian, unlike her husband, Moses ben Leib who was killed at the front.

Resident of Pokatilovo, Boris Belomlinsky, born October 5, 1942. His father, Michael L., (Born Moses ben Leib) in 1912 was Jewish. He was killed at the front in 1942. Boris' mother, being a Ukrainian, avoided the shooting. All of his father’s family was shot in 1942.

After the war, only two Jewish front-line soldiers returned to the village. That was Boris' Uncle Vladimir and the orphan Boris Broitman. Jewish life in Pokatilovo has stopped since. It disappeared, not only into the wet ground, where were "put" some 500 Jews who were the descendants of those who created a story that is only found in the ruins of synagogues and Jewish homes. It has disappeared from the memory of the people living here. They are ashamed to even say the word "Jew" as a leper.

This emphasizes why this ground below our feet is called
"God-forsaken land."

Maryna and Anatoliy Mikhelson,
Sources:
Pokatilovo KehilaLinks website
"The history of the Jews," Paul Johnson
Personal meetings and audio with local residents:
A. Trigub, B.M. Bilomlinsky, N.B. Ivanova, Andrew Barkov

Interview with a local resident: Andrew Stepanovich Barkov.

Born in Pokatilovo on December 13, 1924. His father, Stepan Ignatovich Barkov, was born and died in Pokatilovo.

Question: What can you tell us about the events of the winter of 1942?
Barkov:
The police and the Germans rounded up all the Jews around the school and shot them. They shoot at unarmed innocent elderly, women and children.They were standing naked in the cold awaiting execution. Children were usually beaten with rifle butts. Some of the people were killed immediately, while others fell in the pit from the blow of the shots, and some of them survived. In the evening, executioners and their assistants were tired of this labor and they went to dinner. The remaining people waited. People froze in the cold. Later on, together with the guards, they returned to their previously abandoned houses and spent the night there before their execution, which took place the next day in the same place. It was terrible.
Question: Who shot them, the police or the Germans?
Barkov:
Both Ukrainian police and Germans. Everybody was killed. It was winter February 12, 1942.
Question: Do you remember the names of those killed?
Barkov:
I do not remember. Everybody was killed.
Question: Tell us about your parents. What was their occupation?
Barkov:
My father and mother were born in Pokatilovo. They were owners of their own land and they had cattle and grew crops. In 1930, when collectivization began to spread, they were expropriated and kicked out of the house. I remembered I was 6 years old. I will never forget how we were kicked out on the snow. I was cold and crying. My sister too. Our father was indignant, but he repressed himself. He was sent to Siberia for 10 years because he didn't want to give up his property. He brought back a bit of the money which he had earned in Siberia.
Question: Where the Jews evacuated to the east of the country before the occupation of the Nazis?

Barkov:
I graduated from school here in Pokatilovo. They were two classes, one was a Jewish school (a Cheder) and the second one was a parochial school. I graduated from seven years of study.

Question: Did any Jews live in Pokatilovo after the war?
Barkov:

After the war, there were no more Jews, except for two people who returned from the front: Boris Broitman and Vladimir Belomlinsky.

Thank you for the interview.

Recorded on an audio recorder. August 24, 2012

Anatoliy Mikhelson, Alexander Tregub.

Russian text of the audio interview (LINK)

NOTE: PDF will open in new browser window or tab.

Listen to the audio recording of Andrew Barkov's interview.
NOTE:
Internet Explorer 9, Firefox, Opera, Chrome, and Safari support audio files.

If your browser will not play the interview MP3 audio file, you may download it and play it on another audio player. Note: Your browser may play it automatically upon downloading.

Download this audio interview.

Additional photos taken during the visit.
Larger images of all images on this page are available by selecting the image.
The larger image will open in a new browser window or tab.

The road to Pokatilovo

The road to Pokatilovo

Broken mill and churn - all that has survived to the present day

Broken mill and churn - all that has survived to the present day

Broken mill and churn - all that has survived to the present day

The old bridge over the Yatran river

Our first meeting with the head of the village, Alexander Trigub
Anatoliy on right.

The former hospital. Now, a medical center

The former hospital. Now, a medical center

The Memorial to the victims of the fascism.
It was built in the 1970s on the site proposed to commemorate all the Jewish people killed in February 15, 1942.
It was restored in 2006 in memory of all the people killed,
not just the Jewish people.

The Memorial to the victims of the fascism.
It was built in the 1970s on the site proposed to commemorate all the Jewish people killed in February 15, 1942.
It was restored in 2006 in memory of all the people killed,
not just the Jewish people.

Photo on the Memorial
dedicated to the victims of the fascism.

Rebuilt school, with a backyard and a dining room

Rebuilt school, with a backyard and a dining room

Rebuilt school, with a backyard and a dining room

New kindergarten

School children

Memorial to fallen soldiers of Pokatilovo
(of the 237 people called to war, 118 were killed)

Headquarters of the village with the Lenin monument

Sunset on the Yatran River

Current resident Andrew S. Barkov, born in Dec 13, 1924.
He was a witness and a victim of Stalin's shootings,
the expropriation and the war.
He was deported to Germany to work.

Old abandoned and plundered Jewish Cemetery,
overgrown with thick grass and prickly thorns.
There were two fragments of monuments with an inscription in Hebrew

Old abandoned and plundered Jewish Cemetery,
overgrown with thick grass and prickly thorns.
There were two fragments of monuments with an inscription in Hebrew

Old abandoned and plundered Jewish Cemetery,
overgrown with thick grass and prickly thorns.
There were two fragments of monuments with an inscription in Hebrew

Old abandoned and plundered Jewish Cemetery,
overgrown with thick grass and prickly thorns.
There were two fragments of monuments with an inscription in Hebrew

Old abandoned and plundered Jewish Cemetery,
overgrown with thick grass and prickly thorns.
There were two fragments of monuments with an inscription in Hebrew

Old abandoned and plundered Jewish Cemetery,
overgrown with thick grass and prickly thorns.

Old abandoned and plundered Jewish Cemetery,
overgrown with thick grass and prickly thorns.