View of the ruins of the Kovno ghetto after its liquidation.

Photograph | Photograph Number: 88805

Photographer: George Kadish/Zvi Kadushin
Date: Circa August 1944 - October 1944
Variant Locale: Kauen
Kovno
Kowno
Photo Designation: GHETTOS (MAJOR) -- KOVNO (Lithuania) -- Destruction/Aftermath -- Ruins/Rubble
Photo Credit: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of George Kadish/Zvi Kadushin

Event History: The liquidation of the Kovno ghetto/concentration camp began on Saturday, July 8, 1944, three weeks before the Soviet liberation of the city. Approximately 6,100 Jews were transported over a six-day period to concentration camps: the women to Stutthof and the men to Dachau. Knowing that thousands failed to appear for the round-ups and likely remained hidden in bunkers, the SS ordered German troops to raze the former ghetto. Every house was blown up and the ruins doused with gasoline and incinerated. Thousands were either burned to death or shot trying to flee. The fires burned for a week, leaving a charred landscape of rubble and stone chimneys. Only approximately 100 Jews survived the liquidation.
See https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005174
See Also "Kauen Main Camp" in Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos Volume 1 Part A.
See Also https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005162.
Keyword: DESTRUCTION/VANDALISM
GHETTO/OCCUPATION
KOVNO
RUINS/RUBBLE
VIEWS
Artifact Photographer: Bruce Katz
Photo Source: USHMM (Restricted)

Copyright: Exclusively with provenance

Provenance: George Kadish/Zvi Kadushin

Source Record ID: Collections: CR 1503.072
Published Source: Hidden History of the Kovno Ghetto - United States Holocaust Memorial Museum - Little, Brown and Company - p. 217
: Record last modified: 2005-08-30 00:00:00
This page: https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/pa1088796

Search Our Collections