Madame Nurenberg reported on the pogrom in Berdichev, which had been directly instituted by the Clans of Death and Pashchenko. Krasny reported, on the basis of the deposition of Zolodar, the acting
Mayor of Berdichev, that Pashchenko had declared publicly in the city magistrate's office that he was going to Zhitomir "to get even with the Jews."
Pashchenko made no denial. Kovenko, however, always defended him and the Clans of Death. Kovenko did not justify them nor deny their participation in the pogrom, but in cynical fashion he abused the whole of Jewry and accused them of lending support to the Bolshemki.
Quivering with anger he struck his fists on the table, and his. whole speech was nothing but an incoherent hysterical cry, to the effect that the Clans of Death had acted according to instructions, that the Jews hated the Ukrainians and that the Jews themselves had taken part in the pogrom. "The Clans of Death are the glory of the Ukrainian army, Pashchenko is the best son of Ukrainia, and if he had not been arrested, we should not have lost Kiev. Now that he is free again we shall regain Kiev. They are my Clans of Death. When the Clans of Death marched to Kiev, they hurried so that they upset all the vehicles that were in their way, for they knew why they must hurry to Zhitomir. The Jews have plundered the city. We were not shy, we killed and killed and will kill again. Even this night I will have fifty men hanged in Vinnitza. I am a 'gendarme/ and do not feel a bit embarrassed about it."
When Revutzky began to say something about a rehabilitation of the Ukrainian army, Kovenko cried out, "We do not need its rehabilitation."
The most terrible thing at this meeting were the objections which one of the leaders of the Clans of Death, a typical criminal, raised. They made our blood run cold.
UKRAINE
"As we were approaching Zhitomir," he said, "there came out of one of the trenches two Jews with two long beards like this (a gesture to indicate the length of the beard) and shot at us. When I asked them why they were shooting at us, they replied that they hated the Ukrainians, whereupon I pierced them through." He also said that he had himself killed three Jews in Zhitomir because they plundered the shops during the pogroms. "At the station I caught two Jews with proclamations against the Directory and ran them through with my sword."
When I asked Revutzky the next day why he had arranged this depressing meeting, he said he wanted to know what truth there was in the statement that Kovenko had been the real organizer of the pogroms. I am fully convinced he was.
(Signed) P. GUETERMANN.
To this objective document it must be added that Krasny, who took part in the conference just mentioned, later became minister for Jewish affairs in the Petlura government.
In February, 1919, the position of the Directory became worse. The Bolshevists occupied Kiev. Petlura's troops finally evacuated the Governments of Kherson, Poltava and Kiev. The pogroms gained in extent. They are reported in Yelisavetgrad (4th and 5th of February), Novo-Mirgorod (about the same time), Piriatin and a number of other places in the Government of Poltava. At the railway station of Ramodan, Bobrinsky and other towns, Jews were thrown out of the cars and shot down.
In Lubny a pogrom was prevented only because some hundred men among Petlura's troops made energetic resistance to the pogrom. They even opposed it with arms, designating themselves as the "Local Sotnia." They lost fourteen men, but they saved the city from the pogrom. In Kremenchug the pogrom was prevented at the cost of one and a half million rubles, which the Jews gave to the troops. At the same time pogroms took place in the Government of Kiev, at Vasilkov (7th and 8th of February), Rossovo (i4th and I5th of February), Stiepantsy (i4th of February), Radomysl (i8th to 2Oth of February), Skvira (beginning and end of February). The most terrible pogrom of this month, which denoted a turning point from the primary "pillage" pogroms of the preceding period to the following "Jew-annihilating" pogroms, took place far behind the Petlura front, in Proskurov on the I5th of February and in Felshtin on the 1 6th of the same month. (These two pogroms are described in greater detail in A. I. Hillerson's report in the Appendix, pp. 185 ff.)