Constructed narratives of the understandings of Kaunas ghetto Jewish policemen: "the murder period," August 15 to October 28-29, 1941

ENAnonymous Jewish ghetto policemen (referred to in this article as the authors) wrote a manuscript clandestinely in the Kaunas ghetto from 1942 to 1943. The authors explain that their purpose was to describe the reality in the ghetto through their eyes such that historians would find their work credible. Drawing on James Young’s concept of “historical exegesis,” this article will investigate the authors’ narrative not as factual evidence, but as their constructed narratives to reveal what was true for them in their understandings of the beliefs and actions of Jewish ghetto policemen. This is an understudied area in the historiography, as Jewish ghetto policemen are most commonly viewed in monolithic terms as corrupt, privileged functionaries in the organization and structure of Jewish ghetto police forces. The purpose of this article is to identify the authors’ constructed narratives of Jewish policemen’s beliefs and actions as reflected in their acts of brutality during forced labor roundups and their influence on the selection of ghetto inmates during the Great Action. What did the authors want readers to understand about the beliefs and actions of Jewish ghetto policemen during “the murder period” as revealed in their manuscript?.