Translate statistics into people

The personal effects of Jews presumably at 
Babi Yar (#83559)

Date: September 29, 1941 – September 30, 1941

Photo Credit: Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchive Wiesbaden, courtesy of 
USHMM Photo Archives

Photographer: No photographer recorded


Photo description
According to Operational Situational Report USSR No. 106 of 7 October 1941, elements of Einsatzgruppe C, including Sonderkommando 4a and two Kommandos of Police Regiment South, participated in the execution of 33,771 Jews at the Babi Yar ravine on the outskirts of Kiev. The author of the report claims that the action was carried out in response to complaints about Jews by the local population and with the knowledge of the Wehrmacht which "approved the measures taken." The report also states that both the local population and the Jews were told the action involved the relocation, not the extermination, of local Jews. Orders for Jews to assemble at 6:00pm at an unidentified location were posted throughout the city by Ukrainian collaborators on September 29 and the Jews were then brought to the ravine. 


Relationship to guideline

By seeing the personal items belonging to only a few of the victims of this horrific event, teachers are able to emphasize that the statistics listed above represent the suffering of thousands of individuals.  

previous photo Guideline 11

Guidelines 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14