Overseer's History Blog

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Не жыхары падаравалі ключ ад горада, а расейская імператрыца нямецкага паходжання Кацярына другая, уручыла жыхарам Магілёва ключы.

The community of Derechin has such an interesting and tragic history, especially in relation to the forest partisans. Jews began settling in the town in the beginning of the 17th century, with many of them being tanners and shoemakers. The first all-Russian census conducted in 1897 registered a population of 2,289, of whom 1,573 were Jews.

Derechin was occupied by the Nazis for three years. They immediately placed all Jews in a small ghetto and used them as forced laborers. When seven Jews could escape in June 1942, 150 were shot as a punishment by a German execution squad. After the liquidation of the ghetto in 1943, 3000 Jews were stripped naked and killed at the edge of a pit. Some managed to flee into the forests to join the Bulak partisan team, named after its leader, a Belarusian peasant from a nearby village. Sleeping on the ground in the summer and in graves or caves in the winter, the Partisans used wood or what ever they could find to shield themselves from the cold. Local Belarusians would bring them food.

Under the authority of Bulak, the famous Jewish doctor and fighter Yehezkel Atlas led 300 partisans in an armed attack on the German garrisons in Derechin. They successfully took control of the "jew-free" town and captured 44 German policemen. In rage and desperation, the surviving Jews burned down their old houses – since their relatives had been killed no one should use their property. Atlas ordered the 44 captured German policemen atop the mass grave outside Derechin, where they were lined up and executed. He continued to impress with his bold achievements: Atlas and his men blew up a German train, burned down a bridge, and initiated an attack on Kozlovshchizna in which more than 30 Germans were killed. On December 5, 1942, he was injured in a battle that took place in Wielka Wola. He gave over the command of his company to Eliyahu Lipshowitz as he died from his wounds.

Today, the Jewish cemetery of Derechin was restored thanks to descendants of the survivors. An obelisk installed in 1948 commemorates the approximately 4100 murdered Jews of the town.

A Japanese soldier puts away flowers he had prepared for the Allied soldiers, after the gift was refused. Ie Shima Airfield, 19 August, 1945

A sword , Potsdam Germany 1731. Steel, copper alloy, wood, silver, leather, fabric, gold threads; forging, casting, gilding, engraving.