Villagers look for their dead, Eastern Front, 1943 circa (b/w photo)

Villagers look for their dead, 1943 circa. Photograph, World War Two, Eastern Front (1941-1945), 1943 circa. Soviet civilians search for their dead relatives in the aftermath of a German massacre on the frozen Russian steppe. The Germans, in reprisal for partisan actions, executed thousands of Soviet civilians, but millions more died from starvation as the Germans requisitioned food for their armies and fodder for their horses. As they retreated from Ukraine and Belarus in 1943-1944, the German occupiers systematically destroyed infrastructure, towns, villages and crops. Civilians were left to starve or die of exposure. One of 26 British and Soviet official photographs.