MediaArhiv

Part 4

page 36/206

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ion sent from Mironovka (it is not certain what division it was) instituted a pogrom among the Jews. They were accused of being enemies of the Soviet power — "We must avenge on you the murder of our commander. " Then came the demands, "Give money, gold, silver, etc." The Jewish population was plundered, beaten and killed.

2. Pogrom in Korosten (March 12). Excesses were committed by members of the Red Army, who even demanded the delivery of their own officer who had defended a Jewish woman from a soldier who had taken away from her twenty pounds of sugar.

3. Pogrom in Cherniakhov, Government of Volhynia. On the i8th of April the Qth Soviet regiment passed the unfortunate spot which had suffered any number of pogroms. There was much pillage, in which peasants also took part. The soldiers justified their conduct by alleging that the Jews supported Petlura. There were none killed.

4. Annopol, Government of Volhynia. In the complaint addressed to the Section for Social Relief, the Jews of the place speak of plunder and excesses by the Taraschan regiment. There were no death victims.

5. Volochisk, Government of Volhynia. In the complaint to the Revolutionary Committee the Jewish population report excesses by members of the Red Army. No cases of death are reported.

6. Pillage by a Soviet regiment in Vasilkov, in April.

7. Pillage by the Sumsky regiment in the town of Gorodische (May 3ist), in which Jewish members of the Red Army also took part. There was robbery but no murder.

8. Uman. Here the eighth Soviet regiment of freehooters carried on its activities twice. On the 22nd of March the freebooters instituted a great predatory expedition. On the 22nd of May after a terrible pogrom made by bands, the same regiment came again to Uman, and began to plunder the population, especially the Jews, en masse. There was murder and rape of women and girls. Many Jewish freebooters belonged to the regiment, who were known in the city as professional thieves.

From the detailed minutes of a meeting of party functionaries and public men of the city of Uman it can be seen that the local authorities were trying to fight these excesses. Orders were issued making participation in the pogrom punishable with death, and about ten of the less important bandits were shot. But the military authorities did not succeed in checking the anti-Semitic sentiment that prevailed in the regiment. Up to the first days of July this regiment was not replaced by another despite the urgent request and categorical demands of the authorities of Uman, who repeatedly made appeals orally and in writing to the authorities at Kiev. The regiment could not be relieved because of the critical situation on the outer and inner front, and also for the reason that authorities held the eighth regiment, which was reputed to be an important body of fighters, in readiness to keep down the insurrectionary movement in the precinct of Uman. It is clear from the same minutes that the eighth regiment did in fact prove itself a dangerous opponent in defending the cities against the insurrec* tionary forces who made the district unsafe the whole time and attempted again and again to take possession of Uman. The troops of Tiutiunik, Popov and Klimenko were defeated, and their arms, equipment

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and munitions were taken away from them. As long as the eight regiment remained in Uman there was no fear of its being occupied again by the insurrectionists with a possible repetition of the first terrible pogrom.

It was relieved later by the first Ukrainian Soviet Cavalry Regiment. With the departure of the eighth regiment the plundering also ceased. To be sure, this regiment too was not very friendly to the Jewish population, but plundering happened only occasionally. A company of this regiment which committed acts of violence in the villages demanded among other things that the people give up the "communists and the Jews." In a certain village the soldiers of this company were on the point of killing a Jewish girl because according to their opinion she turned the heads of the men by her beauty.

On the fifth of July the regiment proceeded from Uman to Poltava. In its place came the Fourth International Soviet Regiment. This regiment was the first disciplined body of Soviet soldiers that the people of Uman saw. No more robbery, no more murder took place on account of national or class divisions. The population of the town was able to breathe freely again.

9. Jewish pogrom in Zolotonosha.

10. Pogrom in Obuchovo (May 7; 6th Soviet regiment).

11. Pogrom in Pogrebische (May 18; 8th Soviet regiment).

12. A violent pogrom in Theophipol, Government of Volhynia.