KRASNOLUKI
Pre-1941: Krasnoluki, village, Kholopenichi raion, Minsk oblast’, Belorussian SSR; 1941–1944: Krassnoluki, Rear Area, Army Group Center (rückwärtiges Heeresgebiet Mitte); post-1991: Krasnaluki, Chashniki raion, Vitsebsk voblasts’, Republic of Belarus
Krasnoluki is located 107 kilometers (66 miles) southwest of Vitebsk. On the eve of the German occupation in June 1941, probably around 300 Jews resided in the village.
German forces of Army Group Center occupied Krasnoluki in early July 1941. During the occupation, which lasted until the summer of 1944, a German commandant’s office (Ortskommandantur) was in control of the town. An auxiliary police force (Ordnungsdienst) was recruited from local inhabitants. In early October 1941, a company of Infantry Regiment 354 was based in Krasnoluki and presumably ran the Ortskommandantur at that time.1
Very little information is available about the living conditions of the Jews in Krasnoluki during the summer and fall of [End Page 1688] 1941. It is possible that at some time in the fall of 1941, some form of open ghetto was established in the town, as was the case in the nearby town of Chashniki.
On March 6, 1942, German security forces gathered together in a few houses 305 Jews, composed mainly of women, children, and the elderly, and then escorted them to a pit about 1 kilometer (0.6 mile) outside of town, where they shot them all.2
SOURCES
The “ghetto” in Krasnoluki is mentioned in the following publications: David Meltser and Vladimir Levin, eds., The Black Book with Red Pages (Tragedy and Heroism of Belorussian Jews) (Cockeysville, MD: VIA Press, 2005), p. 229; and Vladimir Adamushko et al., eds., Handbuch der Haftstätten für die Zivilbevölkerung auf dem besetzten Territorium von Belarus 1941–1944 (Minsk: State Committee for Archives and Documentary Collections of the Republic of Belarus, 2001), p. 97. Other secondary sources, however, including, Marat Botvinnik, Pamiatniki genotsida evreev Belarusi (Minsk: Belaruskaia Navuka, 2000), and Rossiiskaia Evreiskaia Entsiklopediia (Moscow: Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Jewish Encyclopedia Research Center, “Epos,” 2004), 5:188, do not mention the existence of a ghetto in Krasnoluki.
Documentation on the murder of the Jews of Krasnoluki can be found in the following archives: BA-MA (RH 26-221/14b); GARF (7021-87-16); and USHMM (RG-22.002M, reel 8).
