The Last Jew in Vinnitsa

Authors

Object ID

2012.1.397

Object Name

Copy, Reprographic

Files

Content Warning

The Bulmash Family Holocaust Collection consists of images, documents, and artifacts related to the Holocaust. The collection contains materials that depict a number of topics that may be difficult for viewers to engage with, including: antisemitic descriptions, caricatures, and representation of Jewish people; Nazi imagery and ideology; descriptions and images of German ghettos; graphic images of the violence of the Holocaust; and the creation of the State of Israel. For more information, see our policy page.

Description

Front: Man sitting in front of a mass grave of many bodies. A man in Nazi uniform points a gun at the first man's head. Behind him are a number of soldiers. Along side of image is the following text: 5/2/1961: CHICAGO: Photo obtained by Al Moss, of Chicago, a former Nazi concentration camp prisoner, shows the execution of a Polish Jew by a German officer at a mass grave somewhere in Poland. Moss said he obtained the picture in Munich in May, 1945 soon after his liberation by American 3rd Army troops. He said he wanted the people of the world "to know what went on in Eichmann's time." UPI TELEPPHOTO-psh.--(CHICAGO OUT) -- Back: Handwritten 'Germany' and 'Atrocities'. One red stamp with date of May 5, 1961. One black rectangular stamp 'PLEASE CREDIT UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL PHOTO...'

Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:

Iconic press photograph with commentary of what has come to be known as "Last Jew in Vinnitsa.” The original photograph was allegedly from an Einsatzgruppe D soldier’s album, and these were the words on the back of the photograph, which portrays in all of its gruesome horror the Einsatzgruppen’s preferred means of dealing with the Jews in the Ukraine prior to the industrialized murder perfected at Auschwitz. Almost 35,000 Jews - men, women and children - were murdered here over the course of three Actions, utilizing Ukrainian militia as well. This was their paradigmatic method until the Nazis were able to generalize from their experiments in mass murder in the T-4 Program utilizing more efficient, less disturbing to the delicate sensibilities of the SS men, though no less barbaric means of managing the “Jewish Problem.”

Dimensions

8 x 6 3/4"

Keywords

Al Moss, Mass grave, Poland, Nazi, Liberation, Execution, United Press International

Subcollection

Atrocity, Bullets

Recommended Citation

"The Last Jew in Vinnitsa" (2016). Bulmash Family Holocaust Collection. 2012.1.397.
https://digital.kenyon.edu/bulmash/1085