On the night of Monday, May 12, at 12.30, the pogrom began. That evening the Jews had begun to hide, some in barns of peasant-acquaintances, some in ravines and gardens. In the house of the smith Srul Kapustiansky there collected a considerable group of the more well-to-do Jews, who thought that here, as in Zlatopol, the poor and artisans would not be disturbed. But this expectation proved unreliable. Perhaps just because a considerable number of Jews were concentrated there, the bandits went thither first of all. About 11.30 at night a band of 25 men knocked at the house. The owner ran to the garret and thence began to cry for help. In reply he heard someone compassionately inquiring from below what the matter was. Kapustiansky was convinced that the bandits had departed and that he was now dealing with people of good intentions. He came down from the garret and opened the door to them. "Stand still!" cried one of the bandits, rushing in. Kapustiansky recognized among the bandits an acquaintance of his, and begged him to take his part, calling him by name. "Aha, you've recognized me, you damned Jew. Well, then, take thatl" And he killed him with a shot. At the shot his wife sprang forth with their three-months' child, but the same fate met them, too. Having finished with the Kapustianskys, the bandits rushed on into the house with wild cries: "Jewish wretches, how long are you going to keep ruling over us?" and opened an irregular fusillade among the people hiding in the house. As a result, only four of the sixteen people who were in the house escaped.
On the next day, Tuesday the 13th, the Executive Committee called an assembly to decide the question of disposal of the bodies of the 12 Jews killed. The assembly decided to have certain peasants bury them near the synagogue. (There was no
Jewish cemetery in Matusovo and the dead were usually carried to Shpola to be buried.) The Jews, who had almost all scattered by this time, somehow learned about this assembly and apparently laid hopes upon it. A certain girl, Aniuta Axelfeld, ran to the assembly and began to weep and entreat them to intervene, declaring that robbers had just attacked her house. But the assembly not only decisively refused to do anything, but even remained entirely uninterested when right there before their eyes a militiaman began to beat the girl. The girl started to run away, but the militiaman Sheremet ran after her, caught her in the prince's park and shot her. At this time, having decided about the bodies, the assembly proceeded to "current questions." The postmaster Kulik made known a telephone message which he alleged he had received to the effect that the communists were marching on Matusovo on account of the killing of the Jews. Kesser informed the assembly to the same effect. The drift of the information was that the communists and Jews had declared war on the peasants, and the latter, therefore, must kill all the Jews as quickly as possible. With this object the assembly decided to arm to the fullest extent, so as to resist both the invading communists and the attacking Jews. With this object a military troop of forty men was organized then and there, into which the most flagrant bandits entered, the two brothers Krasota, Sheremet, the ex-commander of militia Kikidanetz, and others. The assembly decided to bring its decisions to the attention of the other villages which composed the volost (district) of Matusovo, and to propose to them that they, too, organize their military troops on the pattern of Matusovo, for active warfare with the Jews and communists. The military troop immediately left the place to ward off the imaginary attack of the Jews, and in the country they happened upon a group of 26 Jews with a Rabbi at their head. These were killed to a man. On the same day fifteen other people were killed in various places.
On the next day, May 14, an assembly was called again. This time two teachers appeared, Prisovosky and Bubnov, who decided to come energetically to the defense of the Jews, pointing out that the power of the Jews was already gone and only poor wretches remained. At first they were not allowed to speak; the other teachers, their own colleagues, attacked them, threatening them with chastisement. But by this time the peasants had had time to sober down somewhat. They were now convinced that all the tales of Jewish attacks were nothing but pure inventions of Kulik, Kesser, Masin and others.
UKRAINE
The eight or ten Jews who remained in the town (the others who had not been killed had fled to Shpola) were brought to the volost headquarters, and thence to Nukhim Mokievsky's barn, where they were kept under guard. The arrival of Soviet forces freed them.