Towards the end of 1943, the Russian counteroffensive sent the Germans into bloody retreat from the Ukraine, and the Germans began covering up the evidence of their murderous past...

"... A frantic effort was begun to destroy the evidence of wanton excesses and murders. For the macabre Babi Yar task, the Nazis selected about four hundred prisoners from Synets, dividing them into squads, each assigned to a special Sondercommando service. The men were called `Leichen' (corpses) and most of them must have envied those who had already become so. They were housed in bunkers close to the ravine, shackled with chains around their ankles so that they could walk but not run, and were led out at sunrise daily to work for long hours until night fell. One group dug up what remained of the corpses; another searched for rings or earrings and wrenched out the gold in the teeth; another built pyres and large ovens, each to receive hundreds of bodies. Additional groups lit the fires and kept them burning, ground up the bones that were not consumed in the flames, carried the ashes into nearby fields and scattered them for fertilizer. At night, reeking of putrefying flesh, their bodies consumed by scabies, filthy with the mud of reopened mass graves, the Sondercommandos were brought back to their bunkers. Before permitting a few hours of sleep, there was a regular wind-up routine in which a number of the half-conscious prisoners were executed for the amusement of men bored with their guard duty."