Location of the monument: 

Latitude: 57.139

Longitude: 27.187

After the Nazi troops entered Balvi all Jews of the town were arrested and placed in the block, where the synagogue was located. On 9 August 1941 they all were taken to the Celminieki Forest (approximately 5 km from Balvi) and shot by the SD unit “Arājs’ Commando”, together with the local self–defenders. 20 Jews from Vīksna parish (11 km from Balvi) were shot together with the Jews from Balvi.

After the war, relatives of the deceased Balvi Jews, who returned from evacuation and the front, erected a monument on the site of massacre with an inscription in Russian: “Eternal remembrance to deceased Jewish residents of Balvi, shot by German occupants on 9 August 1941”.

 Further reading:

• Meler M. Jewish Latvia: Sites to Remember. Tel-Aviv: Association of Latvian and Estonian Jews in Israel, 2013.
• Ezergailis A. The Holocaust in Latvia, 1941-1944: The Missing Center. Riga: The Historical Institute of Latvia; Washington, DC: US Holocaust Memorial Museum, 1996.

Search for the related names of Jews at http://names.lu.lv.