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Jewish Families Who Died in the Mass Shootings at Kremnička

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Profiles

  • Hermina Hedy Mayer (1901 - 1944)
    (1) Source: Pages of Testimony (Yad Vashem): Last Name: MAYER; First Name HERMINA ; Sex: Female; Date of Birth: 1901; Place of Birth SEBESTANOVA, TRENCIN, SLOVAKIA, CZECHOSLOVAKIA ; Marital Status MARR...
  • Vilmos Wilhelm Viliam Zev Mayer (1889 - 1944)
    (1) MAYER, Viliam (age 32, b. Hralova) son of Jakab Mayer & Cili (Strelinger) married OROVAN, Hermine (age 20, b. Sebastinov) daughter of Jindrich Orovan & Theresa (LOWY). Marriage Registration: 28-Feb...
  • Haviva Marta Reick (1914 - 1944)
    Haviva Reick (alternately, Havivah Reich or Chaviva Reich) (1914–1944) was one of 32 or 33 Palestinian Jewish parachutists sent by the Jewish Agency and Britain's Special Operations Executive (SOE) on ...
  • Anna Löwenbein (1928 - 1944)
    Imprisoned at Nováky Labour Camp, which was liberated in August 1944 during the Slovak National Uprising. Her father Dr., Ing. Rudolf Lowenbein, her mother Gertrude, and Anna were imprisoned in Banská ...
  • Dr. Ing. Rudolf (Rudolph) Löwenbein (1891 - 1944)
    at Nováky Labour Camp, which was liberated in August 1944 during the Slovak National Uprising. Then murdered in the mass shooting in the forest at Kremnicka in November 1944.Rudolf, Gertrude, and Anna ...

The mass killings in Kremnička near Banská Bystrica by the Germans and their Slovakian fascist collaborators, the Hlink guard, took place from 5 November 1944 to 17 March 1945. A total of 747 (mostly Jewish) people were murdered in the forest: 478 men, 211 women and 58 children. The figure was confirmed in post-war exhumations from the massive trenches containing the bodies. Victims were made to kneel in front of a trench and were then shot in the back of the neck. People jumped in to try and hide under the bodies, and many children suffocated under the dead.

One of these mass shootings took place on 20 November 1944, and included Haviva Reick who had emigrated from Banská Bystrica to The Holy Land in 1939 and joined the Palmach in 1942; at the end of her service she joined the British Paratroopers unit in order to return to Slovakia and help rescue Jews.

The bodies were exhumed on April 1945 and identified. Today you can visit the memorial of the murdered victims, which was designed in 1947 by the Slovak architect Dušan Jurkovič. It is about ten minutes' drive from Banská Bystrica, but difficult to find. The Tourist Information Office at Banská Bystrica has a map and the Museum of the Slovak Uprising also has some information.

A list of persons exhumed from the mass grave is available at https://www.vets.cz/vpm/10142-pametni-deska-obetem-holokaustu/

Map: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Pam%C3%A4tn%C3%ADk+obetiam+fa%C5%...