Location of the monument:

Latitude: 55.891462
Longitude: 27.199222

With the beginning of the Nazi occupation of Krāslava, already on 29 June 1941 the local self–defenders began arresting and shooting some Jews. At the end of July mass–scale arrests began, as the result of which the Jews of Krāslava (approximately 1000 people) were placed in two synagogues and adjacent buildings. On 26 July 1941 the arrested Jews were convoyed to the Daugavpils ghetto; the feeblest were shot on the way (approximately 40 persons). In August local self–defenders and policemen arrested a couple of hundred Jews from Krāslava more. Part of them was taken to the Augustovka Ravine (approximately 1 km from Krāslava) and a part of them – to the bank of the Daugava River near turpentine factory and were shot there.

After the war the remains of some Jews from Krāslava and its vicinity (Piedruja, Inda, Robežnieki and Kuprava), together with other victims of war, were reinterred in the so–called Crooked Mile (Krivaja versta), behind the crossing of Vienība and Rīga Streets. The monument bears an inscription in Latvian and Russian: “To the Victims of Fascism 1941–1944”.

 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.