| Bogusze is a small
village on the outskirts of Grajewo. It was the site of a "transit camp," where the Nazis
kept Jews, Russians, and political prisoners waiting to be transported
to the concentration and extermination camps. Jews from many of the nearby
towns (including Radzilow, Stawiski, Szczuczyn and Grajewo) were sent to
Bogusze. The few Jews from Radzilow who had escaped or hid during the pogrom of July 7,
1941 and who were thereafter caught (this included members of
Rachel Finkielsztejn's family), were sent
to Bogusze. Then, in December 1942, Bogusze was liquidated and all the Jews
were sent to Treblinka (53 miles SSW of Radzilow) and
Auschwitz. There are at least three memorials to
the Bogusze Transit Camp in the area, only one of which is on the main road.
From the Stawiski Memorial Book: The Bogusze Camp had served previously
[prior to 1942] as a concentration camp for Russian prisoners of war, where
myriads of prisoners were tortured to death. The forests surrounding
Bogusze were strewn with giant communal graves of prisoners. The camp
occupied a very large area, and was surrounded by a barbed wire fence. It
had trenches covered with simple roofs that served as living quarters for
the residents of the camp. |
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Memorial #1
On the main road |
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Memorial #1 |
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Memorial #1
Translation: "July 22, 1944 - July 22, 1959.
Here, in an area of 50 hectares, from the
years 1941 to 1945, stood a place where
people from different nations were executed,
a Nazi concentration camp.
No more war!
People of the District of Grajewo." |
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Memorial #2
Off a small dirt road, about one mile
down the highway from the center of town |
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Memorial #2 |
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Memorial #2
Translation: "Place soaked with blood:
11,070 prisoners of war and civilians were
murdered by Hitler's troops in the years
1942-1944. Honor to their memory!" |
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Going to Memorial #3
Across the main road and through a small
semi-rural residential area, into a narrow
dirt (and mud) road, and into the forest. |
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Memorial #3
A fairly well-tended memorial out in
the forest, in the middle of nowhere. |
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Memorial #3
Translation: "In honor of the victims of
Hitler's fascist officers and troops: the
Russian army, members of the Movement
of Defiance, prisoners of the Bogusze
concentration camp, Poles, Italians,
Frenchmen, and Lithuanians who died
at the hands of Hitler's executioners
in the years 1941-1945.
People of the District of Grajewo." |
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Photos courtesy of Jeff Kaiser, 2004 |
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Location of Bogusze relative to Szczuczyn and Radzilow |
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