The Reserve Police Battalion 101 was formed in May of 1941 when the Police Battalion 101 was practically completely dispersed due to the reassignment of many of the men to other units. To fill up the then empty ranks, men were drafted into the unit, most of which were

After the executions began, the officers felt that they were not being done in a timely manner, so the men were gathered and showed how to shoot a victim so they could be killed immediately. They were told the exact point that the fixed bayonet was to be placed to aim the gun correctly. This process of regrouping and explaining how to kill more efficiently helped the group kill in a timelier manner. This was a useful thing because it helped the battalion finish their duties on time. The executions were decided to be done on a one-on-one basis. Each Jew was marched by a man of the Reserve Police Battalion 101 into the forest. Once at the desired spot, the Jews were all forced to lie face down on the ground. The officers wanted the killings to happen in unison, so that everyone shot their guns at the same time, but this did not happen because of resistance by a Jew or by a man missing the victim, or only wounding them instead of killing them. This procedure was repeated through all of the executions, which continued until dusk. (Browning 59-60)

After the Jozefow massacre, the men returned to Bilgoraj and many if not all ended up being depressed, angered, and/or shaken. The men all lost their appetite but drank a lot since a generous amount of alcohol was provided for them. Among the men who made up the Reserve Police Battalion 101, the Jozefow Massacre was never discussed and the entire matter was considered taboo. Many of the men had nightmares from that horrible day on July 13, 1942. (Browning, 69)

raw recruits who were drafted reservists. This is why the name was changed to the Reserve Police Battalion 101. Most of the men were from lower orders of German society and very few were economically independent. The average age of the men was 39 and over half were between the ages of 37 and 42. These men were considered to be too old for the German army but not to old for reserve police duty. Virtually none of them had any education besides secondary school, which had ended when they were 14 or 15. The only exception to this was any extra apprenticeship and vocational training they had received. Most of the men had come from Hamburg, which was by reputation one of the least nazified cities in Germany. The majority of the men also came from the social class that had been anti-Nazi in its political culture. These men would not seem to have been a very promising group from which to recruit mass murderers on behalf of the Nazi vision of a racial utopia free of Jews. (Browning, 48)

Early in the morning, on July 13th, Commander Trapp got his men ready and explained the task ahead of them. This is when he told them that if any of the older men did not feel up to the task that lay before them, they could step out. Lieutenant Heinz Buchmann, who was in charge of the First Platoon of the First Company of the Reserve Police Battalion 101, was among the men who refused to shoot the defenseless Jewish women, children and elders, and was therefore reassigned to organize the male working Jews who were to be escorted to Lublin. One of the officers, Sergeant Steinmetz, warned his men that, “he didn’t want to see any cowards.” (Browning, 56) Even with this statement, 10 or 12

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