>Village Name: Caraula (village in Dolj County)
Region, Country: Oltenia Region, Romania
Deportation Date: September 1942
Excerpt from Testimony:
“[…] They were loaded onto a train heading to Transnistria and arrived in Varvaliovka, near the Bug River. The Russian gendarmes took the bodies of the deportees and burned them. The deportees would sometimes find metal helmets along the Bug Riverbanks, which they used for cooking or storing food. They stayed there throughout the winter; many deaths occurred as they went in search of food and tried to keep warm. They lived in a barn. They received bread made from rye seeds, which was hard to eat. They were guarded by gendarmes, but the interviewee could not specify their nationality. She stayed mostly in the barns and saw how piles of bodies were burned.
As the front line approached, the guards began to disappear. The return home was more difficult than living in the barns. Many died on the way back, and many were forced to abandon their children.”
Romanian Archives (if available): N/A
Historical Note on the Roma:
The commune of Caraula is home to one of the largest Roma communities in Dolj County. In the early 19th century, the commune had 1,994 inhabitants (MDGR 1899, II: 194). Around 1930, the commune had 197 Roma out of a total population of 3,119 (RGP 1930. II: 1760–177). According to the interviewee’s testimony, some Roma still practiced traditional crafts, such as brick–making.
Historical Note on Deportation:
The interviewee’s family was deported in September 1942 when the local gendarmes came to their homes and likely escorted them to the nearest city. There, they were loaded into freight cars attached to the special E8 train that departed for Transnistria on September 12, 1942 (ANI, fond IGJ nr. 126/1942: f. 109).
After almost a week, the deportees from Caraula arrived in Transnistria. The interviewee mentioned that her family was relocated to the village of Varvalovka (Oceakov County), where they endured hunger and cold for nearly two years in barns near a collective farm. The meager rations of food, lack of firewood, and a typhus epidemic caused numerous deaths, with the bodies being burned indiscriminately by the guards.
The interviewee’s family was likely repatriated in the spring of 1944 when the Romanian–German troops began to retreat in the face of the advancing Soviet Army. The journey home was long and perilous, with many Roma dying along the way.
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