The First Camp-Action

Every event in and around the camp left its mark on the inmates. The camp began to take on the appearance of an insane asylum. Word was spread about the annihilations of all the camps in the surrounding area: Kamionka where there were firing squads, Borki-Wielkie where twelve hundred Jews were burned to death, and Podwolczyska which was wiped out. The feeling grew that the time was nearing for the Skalat Camp as well.

Almost every day, SS-men came on inspection tours. They did not display the beastly savagery of the past. On the contrary, they continually assured everyone that here in Skalat nothing would occur. To emphasize the importance of the Jewish enterprise, they placed large orders for work with the workshops: another sign that these Jews were indispensable. As in the past, the Germans would carouse at parties especially arranged for them. They would get drunk, laugh and play cards.

In time such revelries became orgies, assuming wild and sadistic forms. On a particular night, the drunken Obersturmbannfuhrer Rebel commanded all the girls in the camp to appear naked in the assembly hall. Neither pleading nor additional bribes could dissuade him. The girls came, driven by shouts and shooting. The hall was bright and rowdy. The band was playing. Suddenly Rebel stood in the center of the hall and ordered the girls to pass in review, one by one, in a measured tread. He beat them with his whip, shouting wildly: “Bad! Do it again!” The girls were forced to repeat the promenade, in the measured tread, under a hail of whiplashes. Laughter and shouts from the revelers and moaning and sobs from the tortured girls blended with the sounds of music.

Meanwhile, the camp management, understanding the impending danger, bent every effort to establish close contact with whichever Germans they could, in order to secure accurate and swift information about their situation. They succeeded in finding one such person in the Schupo member, Marold, whose main motive was, of course, the huge bribes which he received.

On 29 June 1943 this informant came to the camp and whispered a message to Nirler: “The sentence has come down! The liquidation 'action' will take place early tomorrow morning. You have time to save yourselves,” the German said.

Nirler quickly warned everyone: “Hide yourselves wherever you can!” Everyone was shattered by the news. How and where is one to escape? Nirler, Rus and other authorities went off with their families during the night, going outside of town or to villages and well paid for sanctuaries which they had long since arranged for themselves. Many of the inmates, mainly younger people, ran off during the night in various directions. They had no alternative. They ran without planned destinations, wherever their feet carried them. Some 140 people remained in place: the older women and the majority of the 'Shit Brigade' as well as a few lone children, of whom no one took any notice during the general panic. Some of them were ready for whatever might happen so long as it put an end to their torture. Others were dull and apathetic. A small group continued to believe in miracles or that no person should oppose the will of God. However the main reasons for most of those staying behind was the lack of financial resources and having no place to go.

The warning from the Schupo member proved accurate. On 30 June 1943 (27 Sivan 5703), armed SS-men from Tarnopol, along with the local Schupo, Kripo and the Ukrainian police surrounded the Skalat Camp. All remaining inmates were quickly taken to the field outside of town, where the graves of the victims of the previous 'actions,' were located, and, standing beside prepared pits, they were all shot down. Occasionally peasants brought in newly captured Jews who had been wandering.in the fields, those who had fled the camp the night before, and these Jews, too, were made to stand in front of the machine guns. The total number of victims slaughtered that day is estimated at two hundred (200).

The victims were buried by the Ukrainian Construction Battalions.

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Groups of camp escapees wandered the fields, desperate and starving. Seeing neither a goal nor a way out, some headed off into the woods. Most, however, applied to the Otto Heil firm in the nearby village of Nowosiolka, about the possibility of being re-employed. The reply was unclear because the firm had to consult higher authority. The Otto Heil Company sent a representative to Tarnopol who returned that same day with the “good news” that those who had managed to remain alive could organize themselves in a new locked camp in Skalat.

The next day a truck arrived loaded with foodstuff for a limited period of time. Groups of Jews began to return and a young man named Fogel took over the running of the newly-formed camp. When the former camp administrators learned of this, they left their hiding places and returned to resume their previous “positions.” Some two hundred surviving Jews gathered together. The former camp procedures were re-established and the inmates returned to their work in the quarries. The Germans also sent out Jewish labor brigades to other places, since by now they were the only source of Jewish labor.

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