A Brief History
On March 22, 1943, a battalion of military police fighting for Germany was attacked by Byelorussian partisans near the village of Khatyn.
Digging Deeper
The Nazi 118th Battalion was commanded by a German officer, but mostly manned by Ukrainians that hated the Soviet regime, criminals, and Soviet prisoners of war and deserters willing to oppose the Soviet Union.
Suffering 4 men dead from the attack by partisans, including their commander, the enraged battalion went through the village of Khatyn and forced all the population into a barn. The Nazis, having committed similar atrocities throughout Belarus and other Soviet areas they had overrun did not hesitate to immediately carry out a reprisal. The barn was burned with the population in it, and the few that tried to escape were gunned down.
Of the 149 people massacred, 75 had been children. Two other children did survive, as did one adult, though all three were injured. These unfortunate victims were just a few of the 2 million or so civilians murdered by Nazis in Belarus during the war, out of population of little over 8 million!
The Ukraine had suffered millions of people intentionally starved by Joseph Stalin and the Soviets in the 1930’s and many Ukrainians were eager to strike back. Germany took advantage of this and put them to use, often in an anti-partisan role.
A cracked fact is the 118th Battalion commander killed in the attack by partisans was Hans Wollke, the 1936 Olympic gold medalist in the shot put, perhaps contributing to the notoriety of the massacre.
Soviet courts tried one of the 118th’s platoon commanders in 1975 and the battalion chief of staff in 1986, both of whom were sentenced to death. Publicity was kept to a minimum in order to avoid nationalistic animosity between Belarus and The Ukraine.
The Khatyn Massacre is memorialized in Khatyn with a complex built in 1969 that includes three trees and an eternal flame, the trees representing the population of Belarus that survived and the flame representing the quarter of Byelorussians that died. The memorial also features a statue of the lone adult survivor holding his dead son.
A final fact, President Richard Nixon had visited the Khatyn memorial, as had other world leaders such as Fidel Castro and Yasser Arafat.
Question for students (and subscribers): Have you ever visited the visited the Khatyn memorial? Please let us know in the comments section below this article.
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Historical Evidence
For more information, please see…
Himka, John-Paul and Joanna Beata Michlic. Bringing the Dark Past to Light: The Reception of the Holocaust in Postcommunist Europe. University of Nebraska Press, 2013.
Mikaberidze, Alexander. Atrocities, Massacres, and War Crimes [2 volumes]: An Encyclopedia. ABC-CLIO, 2013.
<span class="dsq-postid" data-dsqidentifier="1575 http://www.crackedhistory.com/?p=1575">61 Comments
I guess I don’t understand why it is cracked history to visit a memorial, people do it e dry vacation.
Such a sad part of history
It is extremely sad that people can be so blinded by their hatreds.
Unfortunately, war seems to bring out the worst in people. — DAVID WARDLE
The Nazi’s will always be one of the worst groups in all of human history
Horrible part of history
The odd loyalty fusions remind me of a joint US-wehrmacht fight against a Waffen SS group; strangest team-up that I recall.
Sad that people were willing to go against their own people. Especially children.
War can change the mind of a lot of people.
War really can affect people in ways that those who haven’t served can’t understand. what a tragedy
It is crazy to think that one forth of the population of Belarus was slaughtered during World War 2. I feel as though these facts often go forgotten because people only associate the mass killings of the Nazis with the concentration camps, even though some of the most inhumane and violent acts occurred outside the concentration camps in small towns and villages.
Kill a police officer who’s doing nothing but good. makes no sense.
I noticed in the video that there are wedding parties walking towards the memorial and laying flowers down, is there some sort of significance to this? How did anyone survive when the article states that those who tried to escape were gunned down?
This was really thrown under the bus. The only people I heard about being killed was the Jews in concentration camps. That’s interesting that this was never really brought up about the Belarus being killed
It’s sad that so many children were killed.
Amazing what hatred and power will cause
So many people died even children over hate
sad for the belarus people. even worse when children are included in the picture here.
War is cruel and even the civilians were not safe. To be burned alive or gunned down while trying to escape was a brutal end to a Soviet village.
It’s crazy to see that the Nazi’s killed 1/4th of their population…. Clearly burning people was their favorite way to do it.
Nazis and soviets had much in common careless to the suffering of their own people
It is insane that the Nazis murdered 2 million citizens from Belarus when they only had a population of 8 million. I feel terrible for those involved. I am also saddened about the amount of innocent children murdered.
The number of children that were killed is quite sickening. I do not comprehend how Germany and the soldiers could do such an act.
I’d have to agree with Mikayla, it’s hard to understand how the Nazi soldiers could kill over 2 million citizens out of a population of 8 million. This story itself, is so tragic, out of the 149 people murdered, 75 of which were children. How can someone do that?
I too was appalled that the Nazis killed more than 2 million people out of an 8 million sized population. In addition to the 6 million Jews in the Holocaust that were killed, it is really horrifying to realize how many deaths that Hitler’s regime was responsible for.
I can not believe that of the 149 people that were killed, 75 were children. The memorial that was created for this act is saddening to see but clearly hows how emotional and crewel this attack was by the Nazis. There are definitely better, different ways to show power than to kill innocent children.
i can’t believe the Nazis committed so many atrocious crimes. Its terrible they put a large group of people in a barn and burned it to the ground killing 149 people of which 75 were children. I’m not sure how anyone could commit such an atrocity even if they were given orders to do so. the psychological aspect of group mentality just does not seem like a good enough explanation for the horrible crimes the nazis committed during world war two.
It never sits right with me when I learn about children dying in war. This particular incident involved 75 innocent weaponless children being massacred by fire. It was an atrocious act by the 118th Regime. Although two men were punished for the massacre, it in no way makes up for the lives that were lost.
There are probably so many other devastating attacks by Nazi Germany that we are not even aware of today. They took crime and hate to a different level, and it is sad because so many innocent people lost their lives during World War II, including those in Khatyn and Belarus.
It just shows that atrocities have consequences. It’s horrible what happened to the townspeople, as they were just trying to live their lives. But, the brutality of Stalin allowed this battalion to be formed in the first place. If he had been a fairer leader, then this massacre might never have happened.
I’m not surprised that the Ukrainians wanted to fight with Hitler and his army against the Soviet Union. Stalin had intentionally starved them and they wanted revenge.
This shows how Hitler was able to manipulate different groups to his advantage, in this case the Ukrainians. That is crazy that a quarter of the population of Belarus was killed from the war.
The amount of people killed, especially children, is disturbing. Hitler and Stalin killed so many people in their parts of the world. I cannot imagine being a civilian under either of these regimes. Being stuck between a rock and a hard place, fighting for Hitler against Stalin must have been difficult.
Hitler and Stalin did not care about brutality. It almost seemed as if they thought “the more the merrier” because of how many deaths there were. There were deaths amongst all ages and genders as well.
It is crazy to think that 2 million civilians were murdered in Belarus. That is one fourth of its entire population. The number of children massacred is also cruel and disturbing. This incidence really shows that everyone can be a victim of a war, whether innocent or guilty.
This article helps to shed some light on the horrible side effects of war. So many innocent people die during wars because soldiers are brutal in nature. Leaders such as Hitler and Stalin were ruthless in their pursuit of victory.
I never enjoy reading about anyone dying, but especially not innocent children. It is so upsetting to have that realization of how many people were killed for not reason or were not involved in anyway. Just plain horrific.
How could people burn 75 children alive. How could anyone hate anyone or anything that much to kill in such a way.
This is another brutal act committed by Hitler and his Nazis. Burning 75 innocent children alive is sickening. It was kind of President Nixon and and other world leaders to visit the Khatyn memorial and pay their respects for those who lost their lives.
How could Hitler live with himself! He killed 75 children for no reason. I am curious how many different times something like this occurred and we do not even know about it.
Gives me chills reading that, that is awful. That statue itself is sad to look at, Hitler was no human killing children and it make me sick to read all the pain and suffering he brought on people.
It’s incidences like this that really allow me to question the human psyche and understand just how easily manipulated humans can be because acts like these, committed by large groups, are not natural desires of humans, but rather a product of brainwashing.
Another horrific act by hitler and his men. Even worse committing these acts on children.
This massacre is awful and a very sad amount of casualties that included children.
Wow this is crazy. Some of the Soviet Union people were captured and then were forced into a barn to be killed. The barn was set on fire and the people died but if anyone tried to escape they were shot.
It is sad that this does not surprise me.
What do they have to gain from massacring these people?
This massacre did not seem to be a necessary attack, and unfortunately many lives were lost as a result.
just like reading the last article its all about killing and raping and just destroying peoples life and they gain amusement by this is sickening.
Truly horrifying about them getting round up in the barn and burned/shot. Ukrainians have never seemed to really care for Russia.
It just amazes me the extent man will go to hurt another man just in the name of revenge people can be truly disgusting but one day everybody pays for the things they’ve done.
The desire and feelings of revenge can make people do crazy things. It’s terrible to think about how much violence occurred even after the war ended.
Anytime I read stories of mass murders and the children’s lives are involved it makes the story so much sadder. They are so young and have little understanding of what is going on to begin with.
Along with the massacre dragging the children in the war was terrible!
why the children! 🙁
What is wrong with people?? The barn was burned with some people in it and the few that tried to escape were gunned down.
I hope this doesn’t seem insensitive, but why would they use an eternal flame to memorialize those who had been savagely burned to death?
it just makes me sick to my stomach that they would do that to those people. Especially with children in it.
This is so barbaric. To lock people up in one room and burn them to death. It is hard to imagine someone being so cruel.
You don’t hear about these cities and what happened over there. All we hear about is the major things.
I’m Closter phobic, so I would have been freaking out anyways. That’s torture!