In 1941 the Byelorussian SSR was one of the first districts in the Soviet Union to be predatorily attacked by the German fascist hordes. The German invaders burned down and destroyed 1,277,249 buildings in the towns and villages of Byelorussia. Three million persons lost their roofs and their property. Until the war of 1941 - 1945, Minsk the capital of the Byelorussian SSR, was a rich and flourishing city. The Soviet Army men who entered Minsk on 3 July 1944, found found it a sight of horror, heaps of rubble and ruins. Supplied By: SCRSS - Society for Co-operation in Russian & Soviet Studies