Immediately after occupying the town, the German soldiers and the mobile killing squads began to arrest Communist activists, Jews, and escaped Soviet POWs. Some of the arrestees were taken to the building on 5 Duginez Street. There, they were beaten almost to death (with the Jews singled out for the worst mistreatment), and then herded into the cellar, in preparation for their transportation to the Kazanskaya Hill neighborhood. The mass execution began in late August 1942, and it went on until mid-September that year. The Germans executed as many as 700 civilians, most of them Jews, at several pits in Kazanskaya Hill, in the southwestern section of the town. Usually, the victims would be taken to the pits in the early mornings or the late evenings. There, they were ordered to strip naked, and then shot dead with machine guns. Afterward, the pits were covered with layers of soil and sand.

More information: Yad Vashem