The book is devoted to the search for evidence of the fate of prisoners of the Nazi prison in Gomel, who left inscriptions on the walls of prison cells. After the release of Gomel, the inscriptions were copied, their list was sent to the Prison Directorate of the NKVD of the USSR in Moscow, where it was classified for many years and was not available to researchers. The author was the first Belarusian scientist to familiarize himself with this document and began to search for information about the persons mentioned in it. The drama-filled pages tell about people who have maintained high morale in the face of imminent death, contrast them with those who, for the sake of saving their lives, embarked on the path of betrayal and cooperation with the enemy. It is intended for everyone who is interested in the history of Belarus during the Great Patriotic War.