‘There is no end to the human bones’: Gruesome mass WWII grave that includes 675 children believed to have been drained of blood for wounded German soldiers is unearthed in Russia
- GRAPHIC CONTENT WARNING
- The bodies of 1,362 victims of the Nazis have been discovered in grave in Russia
- Of those victims, 675 are children, and all of them are thought to be civilians
- Almost none of the victims appeared to have any visible signs of wounding
- Experts theorise the bodies of the children may have been from a camp that drained blood to supply German soldiers
By WILL STEWART FOR MAILONLINE
PUBLISHED: 07:21 EST, 19 November 2021 | UPDATED: 12:19 EST, 19 November 2021
](Gruesome mass WWII grave that includes 675 children is unearthed in Russia | Daily Mail Online)
A gruesome previously unknown mass grave of 1,362 Nazi victims - including 675 children - has been unearthed in western Russia.
The dead - all believed to be civilians - were found in a macabre unrecorded genocide burial close to the base of an invading Hitler SS unit during the Second World War, say experts.
The victims - almost all without visible wounds - were naked and without shoes when they were buried.
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One harrowing theory is that younger remains here were from a notorious nearby concentration camp where at any one time 300-plus children were brutally incarcerated solely to supply blood for wounded German officers and soldiers fighting near Leningrad - now St Petersburg.
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The bodies of 1,362 Nazi victims have been discovered at a grave in Novaya Burya village, in the Lomonosovsky district of Leningrad region (pictured)
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The victims - almost all without visible wounds - were naked and without shoes when they were buried
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Pictured: Blue bags filled with the remains of the victims lie to the side of the dig site in Russia
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One theory is that the younger remains were from a notorious nearby concentration camp where at any one time 300-plus children were incarcerated solely to supply blood for wounded German soldiers. Pictured: A memorial to the child victims of the Vyritsa camp
Many newborns-to-teenagers perished here from chronic blood loss.
Head of the mass grave search team Viktor Ionov said: 'We are digging and digging, but there is no end to it at all.
‘And - morally - civilians are harder to dig out than military victims.’
He said: 'The victims were not wearing clothes and shoes.
‘Usually something decayed remains, for example soles - but not here.’
This week 50 sacks of human remains were taken from the burial pit in Novaya Burya village, in the Lomonosovsky district of Leningrad region.
These contained the latest 415 victims - more than half of them children - to be collected from the mass grave.
‘In total the bones of 1,362 people, 675 out of them children, have been dug up here,’ said search volunteer Sergei Beregovoi.
Most of the adults were women, including at least three who were pregnant.
There are no gunshot wounds while very few victims show signs of blows, but most have no indication of their cause of death.
It is expected more victims will be found when searching resumes after the winter.
One tag numbered 1410 was found, but its significance is so far unclear.
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All of the victims uncovered at the site were found to be naked and without any shoes on their feet
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A tag, with the number 1410, was also uncovered by the excavation team - though the significance of the tag is not yet known
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Pictured: German soldiers are seen surveying the battlegrounds with binoculars during the Siege of Leningrad. Smoke can be seen rising from buildings in the distance
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The mass grave was uncovered in the Novaya Burya village, in the Lomonosovsky district of Leningrad region
The first hint of a mass grave came to light when the remains of two adults and a newborn child were found a year ago during a land survey.
Soon afterwards, another 20 skeletons were discovered, and a criminal case for mass murder was opened by the Russian Investigative Committee.
This is now likely to be recategorised as a genocide investigation, say reports.
Investigators believe the bodies were dumped by trucks at the burial site, and they lie a few feet below the surface.
‘The remains were lying in piles,’ Beregovoi told 47news outlet.
‘Some had their arms stretched.’
He had never seen such a distressing burial despite years working on finding lost graves, he said.
‘To be honest, I was utterly horrified, despite all my experience.’
Nazi troops were stationed some 300 metres (985ft) from the site between 1941 and early 1943, during the Siege of Leningrad, now St Petersburg.
An SS unit was also based nearby.
‘The most mysterious thing is that neither the elderly, nor local historians, remember anything about what happened here,’ said Ionov.
‘There is no evidence in the military archives.’
Nor was the site suspected as a graveyard or cemetery.
Ionov said: ‘I do not understand why no-one knows anything at all about what happened here.’
Mass grave of over 1,300 Nazi victims uncovered in western Russia
The first hint of a mass grave came to light when the remains of two adults and a newborn child were found a year ago during a land survey
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Gruesome mass WWII grave that includes 675 children is unearthed in Russia | Daily Mail Online