Presentation of Dragana Trifkovic at the International Conference The Russian Historical Society The Battle of Moscow (30) sentebar 1941. G-20. April 1942).
PHOTO: International Conference The Russian Historical Society The Battle of Moscow (30) sentebar 1941. G-20. April 1942).
located in Moscow 13. December 2024. year
The Bryansk front in World War II was formed on the 14th. August 1941. at the junction of the Central and Reserve fronts, to cover the Bryansk direction. The Bryansk region came under attack from the Nazi army, not long after directive 16. September 1941. year, to capture the Capital - Operation Typhoon. To 19. in September, the German command completed an offensive plan for Army Group Center. Hitler's plan foresaw the capture of the capital in the first three to four months.
Photo: Bryansk front, August 1941.
Orlov-Bryansk operation 30. September – 23. October 1941. it was a defensive operation of the Red Army as an integral part of the Moscow Strategic Defense operation of 1941. years. It took place simultaneously with the Vyazem defensive operation – as a counter-action to the attack of German troops on Moscow. The attack on Bryansk was carried out with the task of breaking through the defenses of the Bryansk front, encircling and destroying its troops and bypassing Moscow from the south and Southeast. During the operation, superior enemy forces surrounded the Red Army units. The composition of the strike force increased to 400 thousand men. It is filled with reserves of OKH (Oberkommando des Heeres)and troops arrived from other sectors of the Eastern Front. By the end of September, the superiority of the enemy over the troops of the Bryansk front in the artillery was 2.6 times, in tanks – 4.5 times, in aircraft 10-11 times.
The Red Army stopped the advance of Guderian 2. tanks and inflicted heavy losses on the enemy. The surviving units broke through the encirclement and occupied the defensive lines. As a result, at the cost of heavy losses, the German offensive on Moscow was delayed for more than two weeks. This allowed Soviet troops to regroup and bring back reserves, including those from the Far East.
In October 1941. the entire territory of the Bryansk region came under Nazi occupation. The Red Army left Bryansk on the 8th. October 1941. the industrial and residential areas located on the territory of the city were at the disposal of the German occupation administration, one of whose responsibilities was to provide conditions for the reception and support of prisoners of war.
Photo: Nazis in Bryansk in front of the train station, August 1941. the year (archive-bryansk.ru)
In the village of Uritsky (then 3 km from Bryansk, today Volodarsky near the city of Bryansk), on the territory of the repair plant No. 6 (stationary automotive workshop for armored vehicles) established in 1924. in 1999, the Nazis established a camp called Dulag-142. Due to the danger of air attacks in July-August 1941. in 1999, plants and factories were evacuated from Bryansk east to the interior of the country, so the repair plant was deserted when the Nazis occupied the area. On the territory of the institute there were several brick buildings (22 buildings on 23 ha of land) that served as workshops and warehouses (armored workshop, mechanical shop, weapons store, boiler room, telephone exchange, etc.) to which the Nazis began bringing the first captured soldiers of the Red Army. It was initially used to hold captured Red Army soldiers who were transported for forced labor to Germany, and then able-bodied civilians (from March 1942). - the inhabitants of Bryansk and nearby villages – who began to be brought to an exile camp in Germany for forced labor. Also the goal of bringing civilians to the camp was to clear areas with high partisan activity. This concentration camp was a transit camp. Durchgangslager - transit camp). Similar camps existed in Europe, where they held Polish, French, British and other prisoners.
Photo: Soviet prisoners of War, Brest 1941. the year (smolbattle.ru)
Captured military personnel from Poland, France and other European countries initially ended up in the collection posts of division prisoners. From there they were transferred to transit camps – "dulage" (NEM. Durchgangslager - transit camp). The captured soldiers and junior commanders were then sent to camps for lower ranks – "stalagas" (NUM. The Stammlager-the main camp), and the officers-in separate officer camps - "flags" (NEM. Offizierslager). From the Stalag, prisoners of war could be transferred to labor camps or penal camps. The camp command for prisoners of war was formed as a special unit of the Wehrmacht. On the front line and in the rear of the army there were usually only transition camps, subordinate to the commands of armies and Army groups.
At the Dulag - 142 camp in Bryansk, prisoners were kept in former warehouses in more than a dozen barracks. Between 1,200–1,500 people were held in unhygienic conditions on four-story wooden beds infected with insects. Military personnel and civilians are not separated. According to the Bryansk researcher of the history of Dulag 142 Pavel Marchenkov, the camp was originally located on the territory of a complex of Soviet military warehouses located on the banks of the right on the outskirts of the Black Bridge (in Bryansk this place is known as gallery sheds). This camp is 14. October 1941. he received the first batch of prisoners of war from the Bryansk boiler of 16 officers and 1,149 soldiers. According to military command documents 580. German army rear area, 20. in October, the number of prisoners taken at Dulag 142 reached 66 officers and 31,228 soldiers. The next day, 10,000 prisoners were transferred to the new place of detention, which became the territory of the repair facility No. 6 in the village of Uritsky. Since then, the locations of the Bryansk POW camps have appeared in German reports as "camp I" (Gallery sheds) and "Camp II" (the territory of the repair base).
Photo: prisoners of war in Dulag camp – 142, October 1941. (archive-bryansk.ru)
The commission of inquiry into the atrocities of the Nazis found that during the existence of Dulag 142, about 80,000 prisoners of war and civilians were held there. From executions and mistreatment, epidemics and starvation, 40,000 prisoners died and were buried in mass graves and pits on the camp's territory. The Nazis tortured and beat prisoners regardless of age and gender. The Dulag-142 operated for two years until the end of the summer of 1943. years.
The FSB Administration for the Bryansk region has declassified archival documents about the crimes against the prisoners of the Nazi camp "Dulag-142" in mid-2021. years. Among the documents published in 2021. the act of the Commission for the determination of atrocities and damage inflicted on Bryansk by the German occupiers, dated 28. September 1945. years.
"The derisive attitude of the Germans was the same towards all who ended up in this camp for any "offenses" were beaten with rubber whips deprived of food for taking boards or plywood for cooking, it was the case that a woman was beaten to death because her child fell into a toilet that was not suitable for children," the document stated.
Photo: Dulag-142 concentration camp scheme, 1942. the year (archive-bryansk.ru)
Instead of gas chambers, inhuman living conditions were created in the camp, which led to painful deaths of people. According to the identified documents, up to 80% of prisoners died of starvation, beatings and Infectious Diseases. In this camp, nutrition was provided: in the morning boiling water (tea) and surrogate bread, adults received 200 grams, per child 100 grams at Five O'clock in the evening of the so – called "Balanda", of Integral buckwheat and flour, without fat, for an adult – 1 liter, per child-half liter. Such a diet led to frequent diseases and then death,“ according to the published documents based on the testimony of witnesses.
Photo: civilians in camp Dulag-142 (archive-bryansk.ru)
Before this time, when there were only prisoners of war in the camp, the food was even worse. "They were given uncooked buckwheat or vegetable polusir waste, which caused stomach ailments, and sometimes they gave nothing at all. The Germans mercilessly shot prisoners of war, witnesses said.
The barracks were full of soil, moisture and cold. Moreover, along with the living people, the corpses lay there for several days – they simply did not have time to carry them out. Because of hunger, dirt and cold, outbreaks of infectious diseases – including typhus and dysentery-broke out. The Germans gave neither medicine nor food for the sick.
Photo: camp barracks Dulag-142 (archive-bryansk.ru)
Of this regime, the first children of preschool age died, then adults, especially the elderly. At least 100-150 corpses were taken from the camp by car to the landfill each day, according to the documents.
The declassified materials from the Bryansk trial show that they are from March 1942. civilians brought to the camp in large numbers – thus the Nazis cleared the territory of the front. Entire families from nearby villages ended up in the camp.
The entire indictment at the Bryansk trial, held in 1945. the year, from which the designation of confidentiality was also removed, was dedicated to Nazi crimes against civilians and military personnel in Dulag-142.
Photo: Order of command of Camp Dulag 142 of 3. July 1942. year
The city administration of Bryansk on the seizure of boots and shoes from prisoners (archive-bryansk.ru)
The camp was guarded not only by the Nazis, but also by security detachment 615. Ukrainian penal battalion, which was part of the Desna Penal Regiment. The documents from which the code of secrecy has been removed indicate that it is 615. battalion formed from prisoners of war of Ukrainian nationality, starting in the spring of 1942. years.
Photo: partisan doctor Miminoshvili, prisoner of the Dulag-142 camp and the inscription on the wall of the camp
there are more than 1,000 records (archive-bryansk.ru)
It also stripped the list of Germans who served in Dulag-142 and participated in crimes against prisoners of war and civilians. According to the documents, one of the camp's first commanders, Martin Weiss, led the volunteer Penal Regiment Desna, which comprised the 615th Infantry Regiment. Ukrainian penal battalion.
"In addition to the prisoners in Dulag 142 dying of starvation, they were beaten and shot. Dulag's commander, Major Weiss, personally shot about 200 prisoners of war and beat about the same number to death. The Germans used different methods of punishing prisoners of war. For example, Jews and communists were tied to a pole at a distance of 1.5-2 meters from each other and forced into minefields, where they perished. Elderly women and women with children were punished for improper use of the toilet by standing in a cold room for 2-3 days without water or food. For an extra piece of bread eaten, they were systematically beaten with bars and made to lie on ice. Prisoners were stripped of leather shoes, walked barefoot or in wooden clogs.“
Due to the fact that after the liberation of Bryansk on the territory of the former camp, a closed military enterprise (repair Institute 85) began to work again, this bitter page of history remained unknown to a wide circle of people for a long time.
Photo: Tatjana Stojanovic, Ernur Kurmanov and Dragana Trifkovic in front of the monument to the victims of fascism on the territory of the former Dulag-142 concentration camp in Bryansk (personal archive)
After the publication of the documents, work continued on collecting evidence of Nazi crimes within the project "without obsolescence". Also on the territory of the camp are carried out excavations in order to establish all the mass graves located there. It was originally thought that the mass grave was located just below the monument "victims of fascism 1941-1943" which was erected in the 60s on the territory of the former camp, but it was established that there were dozens more mass graves on the territory of the former reconstruction Institute, i.e. camp.
During the implementation of the federal project "without obsolescence", which was carried out on the order of the president of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin, preserved historical sites of the former Dulag 142 concentration camp were identified in the Bryansk region.
Photo: Dulag 142, 1942. the Center for documentation of Contemporary History of the Bryansk region
Dulag 142 is a unique facility, the first and only complex of the former concentration camp on the territory of the Russian Federation, which received the status of a facility of federal importance. In November 2022. year at 45. at the meeting of the Russian organizing committee "victory" President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin supported the idea of creating a museum-educational complex on the site of a former concentration camp. The museum-educational complex Dulag 142 will become tangible evidence of the genocide of the Nazis against Russian civilians during World War II.
Photo: Exhibition on the Dulag 142 concentration camp in Bryansk
Source: Center for Geostrategic Studies
28. December 2024.
