1 Killing site(s)
Haralds Ē., born in 1932: "There were shootings on Pīnas Hill, about 5 km from Valka. One summer day, as I was walking home, I saw a truck carrying weapons and people heading toward the hill. At the same time, an elderly woman without shoes was running in the same direction. I believe she was trying to reach the truck because her children might have been inside it. Later that same day, I heard shots coming from the hill. Still during the German occupation, we eventually learned that the people who were shot there were Jews." (Testimony N°YIU123LV, interviewed in Bilska, on August 12, 2022)
"My wife, Irma Brasmaïs, aged 40, was arrested in June 1941 for carrying a flag during the May 1st parade and was shot by the Germans on Pīnas Hill, in Valka volost. In December 1943, I visited a policeman I knew, Ekchtein, to find out what had happened to my wife. Ekchtein took out one register, then another, and found my wife’s name. He told me that she had been shot on Pīnas Hill and that fifteen other people were buried in the same grave as her.
I then asked him how many people in total had been shot and buried on Pīnas Hill. As he continued to search through the records, he told me that there was also a grave containing eighty-four people who had been shot on August 8, 1941, and that Jews, Roma, and prisoners of war had also been executed there. In total, about 300 people were shot and buried on Pīnas Hill. After that, my conversation with Ekchtein ended." [Deposition of Yan Yanovitch Brasmais, born in 1893, given to the State Extraordinary Soviet Commission (ChGK) on December 28 1944; GARF 7021-93-66/Copy USHMM RG.22-002M; pp. 89-90]
"Since I lived half a kilometer from Pīnas Hill, I very often heard the shootings of civilians carried out by the German fascist invaders. However, I did not see them, as we were forbidden to leave our homes during the executions.
I remember the following incident. In August 1941, I was preparing to go to the town of Valka. When I stepped out of my house, I encountered a covered truck driving along the road. Shortly afterward, I heard gunshots coming from the hill. I turned around and saw, at the top of the hill, the same covered truck I had passed earlier, and next to it policemen who were shooting a group of 25–30 people.
In the evening, as I was returning from Valka, I came across six policemen carrying shovels and rifles, coming from the direction of Pīnas Hill. I do not know their names, as they were not locals.
When I returned home, I was told that on that day the truck had made four trips and that the people it transported had been shot. Two days later, I passed by Pīnas Hill and saw two new graves containing the executed people. Bloodstains were visible around the graves. I did not see anything else with my own eyes.
In 1941, the policemen and the Schutzmen (Schutzmannschaft) frequently carried out shootings on Pīnas Hill […] " [Deposition of Emma Karlovna Mezis, born in 1897, given to the State Extraordinary Soviet Commission (ChGK) on January 20 1945; GARF 7021-93-66/Copy USHMM RG.22-002M; pp. 91-93]
Valka is situated approximately 156 km (97 mi) northeast of Riga, near the Estonian border. The town was first mentioned in historical records in 1286; however, its Jewish community was not established until after 1861, when only two Jewish residents were documented. By 1897, the Jewish population had grown significantly, numbering 380 individuals, or 3.47% of the town’s total population. In the broader Valka district, the Jewish population reached 1,388 in the same year.
After the town was divided in 1920 between the newly established states of Latvia and Estonia, adopting the slogan "One Town, Two Countries," 97 Jews remained in the Latvian part of Valka, along with the local Jewish cemetery, while the synagogue was located in the Estonian section, known as Valga. Under an agreement between the two countries, Jews from Valka were permitted to attend religious services in Valga, and some Jewish children from the Latvian side also enrolled in the Jewish school located there. In 1928, the Jewish community of Valka built its own synagogue within the town.
The 1935 census recorded 57 Jews in Valka, representing 1.7% of the town’s population. In the wider Valka district, Jews were present in only 17 out of 39 volosts.
The majority of Valka’s Jewish residents managed to evacuate before July 8, 1941, when the town was occupied by German troops.
Valka is among the Latvian towns where the exact circumstances surrounding the destruction of the local Jewish community have not been fully documented. It is known, however, that the Jews who did not evacuate were shot at Pīnas Hill, located approximately 4 km from the town, together with Latvian, Russian, and Roma victims.
According to Soviet archival records, local residents were prohibited from approaching the killing site. Nevertheless, many witnessed trucks transporting people toward Pīnas Hill and soon afterward heard gunshots coming from that direction. In her deposition, Emma Karlovna Mezis stated that she saw a group of approximately 25 to 30 people being shot on the hill by policemen.
Information collected by Yahad corroborates these accounts. Haralds Ē., a local resident born in 1932, reported seeing a truck filled with people and accompanied by armed guards heading toward the same area, followed shortly by the sound of gunfire. He later learned that Jews had been killed there.
In total, over the course of several Aktions, approximately 300 people were murdered at Pīnas Hill and buried in four mass graves. One of these graves contains the bodies of 84 individuals who were killed on August 8 1941. According to Yad Vashem, the number of Holocaust victims from Valka is estimated at around 50.
During the Soviet era, an uninscribed monument was erected at the killing site on Pīnas Hill. In 2008, the Council of Jewish Communities of Latvia placed a memorial stone nearby to honor the Jewish victims. The stone lists the names of those murdered in 1941 by the Nazis and their collaborators: Zacharius Gringold, Taube Ribink, and members of the Zimbel family, including Leiba, Bertha, Dinah, Chaim, and Elias.
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