36 Facts About Alexander Pechersky

Alexander Pechersky is one of the organizers, and the leader, of the most successful uprising and mass-escape of Jews from a Nazi extermination camp during World War II, which occurred at the Sobibor extermination camp on 14 October 1943.

In 1948, Pechersky was arrested by the Soviet authorities along with his brother during the countrywide Rootless cosmopolitan campaign against Jews suspected of pro-Western leanings but released later due in part to mounting international pressure.

Alexander Pechersky was prevented by the Soviet government from leaving the country to testify in international trials related to Sobibor, including the Eichmann Trial in Israel; foreign investigators were only allowed to collect his testimony under KGB supervision.

Alexander Pechersky, a son of a Jewish lawyer, was born on 22 February 1909 in Kremenchuk, Poltava Governorate, Russian Empire.

On 22 June 1941, the day when Germany invaded the Soviet Union, Alexander Pechersky was conscripted into the Soviet Red Army with a rank of junior lieutenant.

Alexander Pechersky did not receive any medals for this deed.

Captured, Alexander Pechersky soon contracted typhus, but survived the seven-month-long illness.

Alexander Pechersky was then sent to a penal camp at Borisov, Belarus, and from there to a prisoner of war camp located in the forest next to the city of Minsk.

Alexander Pechersky was thin, his upper lip shaking and his left eye bloodshot.

Alexander Pechersky always had a hangover or was drunk and committed unspeakable horrors.

Alexander Pechersky shot people for no reason and his favorite hobby was commanding his dog to attack random people who were ordered not to defend themselves.

Eighty prisoners from the train, including Alexander Pechersky, were selected for work in Lager II.

Alexander Pechersky warned me that the guards forbade looking there, and told me that they are burning the corpses of my murdered comrades who arrived with me that day.

Alexander Pechersky, still wearing his Soviet Army uniform, was assigned to dig up tree stumps in the North Camp.

Alexander Pechersky stopped chopping and watched the whipping while resting on his axe.

Alexander Pechersky replied that he doesn't smoke, turned around and got back to chopping down new tree stumps.

Alexander Pechersky replied that the rations at the concentration camp were more than adequate and that he wasn't hungry.

Alexander Pechersky's plan merged the idea of a mass escape with vengeance: to help as many prisoners as possible to escape while executing SS officers and guards.

Five days after arriving at Sobibor, Alexander Pechersky was again approached by Solomon Leitman on behalf of Felhendler, the leader of the camp's Polish Jews.

Leitman was one of the few prisoners who understood Russian and Alexander Pechersky did not speak either Yiddish or Polish.

Alexander Pechersky was invited to talk with a group of Jewish prisoner leaders from Poland, to whom he spoke about the Red Army victory in the Battle of Stalingrad and partisan victories.

Alexander Pechersky clandestinely met with Felhendler under the guise of meeting Luka, a woman he was supposedly involved with.

The sound of the gunfire prompted Alexander Pechersky to begin the revolt earlier than planned.

Alexander Pechersky was able to escape into the woods and at the end of the uprising, eleven German SS personnel and an unknown number of Ukrainian guards had been killed.

For over a year, Alexander Pechersky fought with the Yehiel's Group partisans as a demolition expert and later with the Soviet group of Voroshilov Partisans, until the Red Army drove out the Germans from Belarus.

The Commission listened to Alexander Pechersky and published the report Uprising in Sobibor based on his testimony.

For fighting the Germans as part of the penal battalions, Alexander Pechersky was promoted to the rank of captain and received a medal for bravery.

Alexander Pechersky was eventually discharged after a serious foot injury.

In 1948, during Stalin's persecution of Jews, known as the 'Rootless cosmopolitan' campaign targeting those who allegedly lacked true loyalty and commitment to Stalinism and the Soviet Union, Alexander Pechersky lost his job and was briefly arrested.

Alexander Pechersky had to sell handcrafted clothes on the local market for five years because he could not find a job.

Alexander Pechersky's brother succumbed to a diabetic coma while incarcerated.

Alexander Pechersky worked for a short time at a small cinema as a director.

The Soviet government prevented Alexander Pechersky from testifying at the Eichmann Trial in Israel, only allowing a short deposition in Moscow which was controlled by the KGB.

Alexander Pechersky died on 19 January 1990 and was buried at the Northern cemetery in Rostov-on-Don, Russia.

Alexander Pechersky did not attend the premiere of the film; his widow later stated that the Soviet government denied him permission to travel to the United States.

In 2013, Alexander Pechersky was posthumously awarded the Knight's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland.