Introduction to this collection

The Holocaust was a tragedy of such incredible scale that it is difficult to truly understand. It took place over many years, spread out over a large geographical area. The brutal actions, while savage, were often carried out in routinized, legalized ways; perpetrators often claimed to be simply following orders. The experiences of the victims were diverse, but also universally terrible. These sources illustrate how experiences and perspectives of the Holocaust could be quite different, but they are all views of a unique atrocity that reverberated across communities and generations. This collection includes anonymous letters, pleading for help or bidding loved ones farewell toward the end. Testimonies and diaries, from perpetrators, witnesses, and victims give firsthand accounts. Laws and policies give us a sense of the blueprints which gave the immense violence of the Holocaust a chilling logic and order, though it often appears senseless.

Contents

Source 1 – Farewell letters from Tarnopol Ghetto, 1943 (1:25)

Source 2 – Affidavit of Hermann Friedrich Graebe, 1942 (5:35)

Source 3 – Kurt Gerstein’s eye-witness account of gassings at Belzec and Treblinka, 1945 (11:50)

Source 4 – Testimony of Nurse Berta Netz, Munich, 1962 (20:40)

Source 5 – Law for the Protection against Hereditarily Diseased Offspring, 1933 (28:05)

Source 6 – An anonymous letter from a gay man to the Reich bishop, 1935 (30:25)

Source 7 – Policy and Operations Concerning Jews in the Occupied Territories, 1939 (36:35)

Source 8 – Dawid Sierakowiak’s Notebooks from the Łódź Ghetto, 1942 (41:25)

Source 9 – Stefania Staszewska’s Warsaw Ghetto Diary, 1944 (47:35)

Supplementary image gallery

Source 1 – Farewell letters from Tarnopol Ghetto, 1943 (1:25)

Excerpt

7 APRIL 1943

My beloved!

Before I leave this world, I want to leave behind a few lines to you, my loved ones. When this letter reaches you one day, I myself will no longer be there, nor will any of us. Our end is drawing near. One feels it, one knows it. Just like the innocent, defenseless Jews already executed, we are all condemned to death. In the very near future it will be our turn, as the small remainder left over from the mass murders. There is no way for us to escape this horrible, ghastly death.

At the very beginning [in June 1941] some 5,000 men were killed, among them my husband. After six weeks, following a five-day search between the corpses, I found his body . . . Since that day life has ceased for me. Not even in my girlish dreams could I once have wished for a better and more faithful companion. I was only granted two years and two months of happiness. And now? Tired from so much searching among the bodies, one was “glad” to have found his as well; are there words in which to express these torments?

26 APRIL 1943

I am still alive and I want to describe to you what happened from the 7th to this day. Now then, it is told that everyone’s turn comes up next. [By now], Galicia [is probably] totally rid of Jews. Above all, the ghetto is to be liquidated by the 1st of May. During the last days thousands have again been shot. . .it looks like this: before the grave one is stripped naked, then forced to kneel down and wait for the shot. The [other] victims stand in line and await their turn. Moreover, they have to sort the first, the executed, in the graves so that the space is used well and order prevails. The entire procedure does not take long. In half an hour the clothes of the executed return to the camp.

After the actions the Jewish council¹ received a bill for 30,000 Zloty to pay for used bullets . . . Why can we not cry, why can we not defend ourselves? How can one see so much innocent blood flowing and say nothing, do nothing and await the same death oneself? We are compelled to go under so miserably, so pitilessly. . . Do you think we want to end this way, die this way? No! No! Despite all these experiences, [t]he urge for self-preservation has now often become greater, the will to live stronger, the closer death is. It is beyond comprehension.

Citation

1 During World War II, the Nazis established Jewish councils (Judenraete) in the ghettos. They were required to make sure that Nazi orders and regulations were implemented and to provide basic services for the Jewish populations living in the ghettos. They faced moral dilemmas, like whether or not to list names of Jews for deportation. The role of Jewish councils is controversial.

Source 2 – Affidavit of Hermann Friedrich Graebe, 1942 (5:35)

Excerpt

I, the undersigned, Hermann Friedrich Graebe, make the following declaration under oath:

From September 1941 to January 1944 I was director and chief engineer of the Zdolbunow branch of the Josef Jung Construction Company of Solingen. In this capacity I had, among my other duties, to visit the firm’s projects. Under the terms of a contract with the army construction services, the company was to build grain warehouses on the old Dubno airfield in the Ukraine.

On October 5, 1942, at the time of my visit to the construction offices in Dubno, my foreman. . . told me that some Dubno Jews had been shot near the building in three huge ditches about 30 meters long and 3 meters deep. The number of people killed daily was about 1,500. The 5,000 Jews who had lived in Dubno before the Pogrom were all marked for liquidation. Since the executions took place in the presence of my employee, he was painfully [upset] by them.

Accompanied by [Hubert] Moennikes, I then went to the work area. I saw great mounds of earth about 30 meters long and 2 high. Several trucks were parked nearby. Armed Ukrainian militia were making people get out, under the surveillance of SS soldiers. The same militiamen were responsible for guard duty and driving the trucks. The people in the trucks wore the regulation yellow pieces of cloth that identified them as Jews on the front and back of their clothing.

Moennikes and I went straight toward the ditches without being stopped. When we neared the mound, I heard a series of rifle shots close by. The people from the trucks – men, women and children – were forced to undress under the supervision of an SS soldier with a whip in his hand. They were [forced] to put their [belongings] in certain spots: shoes, clothing, and underwear separately. I saw a pile of shoes, about 800-¬1,000 pairs, great heaps of underwear and clothing. Without weeping or crying out, these people undressed and stood together in family groups, embracing each other and saying goodbye while waiting for a sign from the SS soldier, who stood on the edge of the ditch, a whip in his hand, too. During the fifteen minutes I stayed there, I did not hear a single complaint, or plea for mercy. I watched a family of about eight: a man and woman about fifty years old, surrounded by their children of about one, eight, and ten, and two big girls about twenty and twenty¬-four. An old lady, her hair completely white, held the baby in her arms, rocking it, and singing it a song. The infant was crying aloud with delight. The parents watched the groups with tears in their eyes. The father held the ten-¬year¬-old boy by the hand, speaking softly to him: the child struggled to hold back his tears. Then the father pointed a finger to the sky, and, stroking the child’s head, seemed to be explaining something. At this moment, the SS near the ditch called something to his comrade. The latter counted off some twenty people and ordered them behind the mound. The family of which I have just spoken was in the group.

I still remember the young girl, slender and dark, who, passing near me, pointed at herself, saying, “twenty- three.” I walked around the mound and faced a frightful common grave. Tightly packed corpses were heaped so close together that only the heads showed. Most were wounded in the head and the blood flowed over their shoulders. Some still moved. Others raised their hands and turned their heads to show that they were still alive. The ditch was two-¬thirds full. I estimate that it held a thousand bodies. I turned my eyes toward the man who had carried out the execution. He was an SS man; he was seated, legs swinging, on the narrow edge of the ditch; an automatic rifle rested on his knees and he was smoking a cigarette. The people, completely naked, climbed down a few steps cut in the clay wall and stopped at the spot indicated by the SS man. Facing the dead and wounded, they spoke softly to them. Then I heard a series of rifle shots. I looked in the ditch and saw their bodies contorting, their heads, already inert, sinking on the corpses beneath. The blood flowed from the nape of their necks. I was astonished not to be ordered away, but I noticed two or three uniformed postmen nearby. A new batch of victims approached the place. They climbed down into the ditch, lined up in front of the previous victims, and were shot.

Citation

Source 3 – Kurt Gerstein’s eye-witness account of gassings at Belzec and Treblinka, 1945 (11:50)

Excerpt

We left for Belzec two days later. A small special station with two platforms was set up on a yellow sand hill, immediately to the north of the Lublin–Lwów railway.² To the south, near the road, were some service buildings. … We saw no dead that day, but a pestilential [deadly or poisonous] odor blanketed the whole region and millions of flies were everywhere. Alongside the station was a large barrack marked “Cloak Room,” with a ticket window inside marked “Valuables.” Further on, a room with about a hundred chairs, “Barber.” Then a passageway about 150 meters long, in the open, barbed wire on both sides, and notices: “To Baths and Inhalators.” In front of us was a building of the bathhouse type, with large pots of geraniums and other flowers. Then stairs and then left and right 3 enclosures 5 meters square, 1.90 meters high, with wooden doors like garages. At the rear wall, not properly visible in the darkness, large wooden platform doors. On the roof, a copper Star of David. On the building, the inscription: “Heckenholt Foundation.” That afternoon I saw nothing else.

Next morning, a few minutes before seven, I was told: “In ten minutes the first train will arrive!” Indeed, a few minutes later a train arrived from Lemberg, with 45 cars holding 6,700 people, of whom 1,450 were already dead on arrival. Behind the small barbed-wired window, children, young ones, frightened to death, women, men. The train pulled in: 200 Ukrainians detailed for the task wrenched open the doors and with their leather whips drove the Jews out of the cars. A loud- speaker issued instructions: to remove all clothing, even artificial limbs and eyeglasses; to tie their shoes together with small pieces of string handed out by a little Jewish boy; to turn in all valuables, all money at the ticket window “Valuables,” without voucher, without receipt. Women and girls were to have their hair cut off in the “Barber’s” barrack. . .Then the march began. To the left and right, barbed wire; behind, two dozen Ukrainians, guns in hand.

They approached. Wirth and I, we were standing on the ramp in front of the death chambers. Completely nude, men, women, young girls, children, babies, cripples, filed by. At the corner stood a heavy SS man, who told the poor people, in a pastoral [priestly] voice: “No harm will come to you! You just have to breathe very deeply, that strengthens the lungs, inhaling is a means of preventing contagious diseases. It’s a good disinfection!” They asked what was going to happen to them. He told them: “The men will have to work, building roads and houses. But the women won’t be obliged to do so; they’ll do housework, cooking.” For some of these poor creatures, this was a last small hope, enough to carry them, unresisting, as far as the death chambers. Most of them knew all, the odor confirmed it! They walked up the small wooden flight of stairs and entered the death chambers, most without a word, pushed forward by those behind them. One Jewish woman of about forty, her eyes flaming torches, cursed the murderers; after several whiplashes by Captain Wirth in person, she disappeared into the gas chamber. . . .

Inside the chambers, SS men crowd the people. “Fill them up well,” Wirth had ordered, “700 to 800 of them every 25 square meters.” The doors are shut. Meanwhile, the rest of the people from the train, naked, wait. I am told: “Naked even in winter!” “But they may catch their death!” “But that’s what they’re here for!” was the reply. At that moment, I understand the reason for the inscription “Heckenholt.” Heckenholt was the driver of the diesel truck whose exhaust gases were to be used to kill these unfortunates. SS Unterscharführer (junior squad leader) Heckenholt was making great efforts to get the engine running. But it [wouldn’t run]. . .50 minutes, 70 minutes, and the diesel did not start! The people wait inside the gas chambers. In vain. They can be heard weeping, “like in the synagogue,” says Professor Pfannenstiel,³ his eyes glued to a window in the wooden door. Furious, Captain Wirth lashes the Ukrainian assisting Heckenholt 12, 13 times in the face. After two hours and 49 minutes – the stop watch recorded it all – the diesel started. Up to that moment, the people shut up in those four crowded chambers were still alive, four times 750 persons in four times 45 cubic meters! Another 25 minutes elapsed. Many were already dead; that could be seen through the small window when an electric lamp inside lit up the chamber for a few moments. After 28 minutes, only a few were still alive. Finally, after 32 minutes, all were dead.

On the far side members of the work commando opened the wooden doors. They – themselves Jews – were promised their lives and a small percentage of the valuables and money collected for this terrible service. Like pillars of basalt, the dead were still [standing], not having any space to fall, or to lean. Even in death, families could be seen still holding hands. It is hard to separate them as the chambers are emptied to make way for the next load; corpses were tossed out, blue, wet with sweat and urine, the legs covered with feces and menstrual blood. Two dozen workers were busy checking the mouths of the dead, which they opened with iron hooks. “Gold to the left, without gold to the right!” Others inspected anuses and genital organs, searching for money, diamonds, gold, etc. Dentists hammered out gold teeth, bridges, and crowns. In the midst of them stood Captain Wirth. He was in his element, and showing me a large can full of teeth, he said: “See for yourself the weight of that gold! It’s only from yesterday and the day before. You can’t imagine what we find every day – dollars, diamonds, gold! You’ll see yourself!”. . . .

Then the bodies were flung into large trenches, each 100×20×12 meters, located near the gas chambers . . .

Subsequently, I was told, the bodies were piled on train rails and burned in diesel oil so that they would disappear. . . .

Citation

2 A railway between the cities of Lublin in modern-day Poland and Lwow in modern-day Ukraine.
3 Wilhelm Pfannenstiel, a German physician, member of the Nazi Party and an SS officer.

Source 4 – Testimony of Nurse Berta Netz, Munich, 1962 (20:40)

Excerpt

It was still in the fall of 1942 when a newly admitted patient came to our station. It was a mentally deficient girl, about 17 or 18 years old, and Frau Dr. Wernicke ordered her to be sent to the isolation room. Some time after the admittance Frau Dr. Wernicke ordered injections of 2 cc [cubic centimeters] of Morphine-Scopolamine⁴ as the patient’s treatment. The girl was then given daily injections of 2 cc of Morphine-Scopolamine for about 14 days… I had to administer the aforementioned dosage of MS to one of the upper arms of the patient maybe two or three times during the time span mentioned above. I did not give any thought to this treatment at the time. But when the girl receiving this treatment died after 14 days, of course I [concluded] that her death had been caused solely by the injections given to her. Starting in that fall of 1942, adult patients and also children were often moved to the so-called isolation room. Of course in the meantime I realized the purpose of these transfers. But I could not bring myself to speak with anyone about it. On the one hand I was forbidden to do so by the pledge of secrecy, which was especially emphasized to me by the hospital director Grabowski and the head physician Dr. Wernicke. On the other hand . . .I had hardly any contact with the other nurses. . . .

[About] once or twice a week, adult patients or children were [selected and] transferred to the isolation room on orders from Frau Dr. Wernicke. The patients transferred there were undressed, dressed in a nightgown, and put to bed. . . Generally, after some encouragement, the patients drank the dissolved tablets without further ado. After the patients had swallowed the Veronal⁵ preparation they were give a glass of clear water to wash it down. I cannot for the life of me remember a time when the Veronal preparation was not effective. Always after about a half-hour the patients were either asleep or in a semiconscious state. . . After the above-mentioned half- hour had elapsed, the adult patient or child who was in the isolation room at the time was injected with Morphine-Scopolamine. When I had to give these injections, I first made sure that the patient was really asleep. . . [then,] I administered the Morphine-Scopolamine from a filled syringe into the upper left arm of the patient or child. The injection in the upper left arm was ordered by the physician, Dr. Wernicke, presumably because this part of the body was closer to the heart and the medication would therefore act faster. . . After the patients were in a sleeping state, further assistance was not necessary.

The rounds were always made in the early morning hours. Right after that the patient was transferred to the isolation room, Veronal was administered, and a half hour later the injection of Morphine-Scopolamine was given. About noon or sometimes in the afternoon head physician Dr. Wernicke would confirm the death of the patient who had been sent to the isolation room. About two hours later, that would be in the late afternoon, the bodies were taken from our station to the morgue by male patients. . . . .

Some time after the treatment of the 17- to 18-year old girl. . .I was called to the office of administrative director Grabowski. . .Without being able to repeat Grabowski’s exact words, I can still recall that he spoke to us about how it would be a relief for the patients of our institution if they were released from their terrible suffering. As the conversation continued, he admonished [us] to strictly follow all of Frau Dr. Wernicke’s orders. Grabowski did not specifically mention the killings of mentally ill patients nor the way they were to be carried out, but based on his remarks we had no doubt that he was speaking to us about the killing of mentally ill patients. On this occasion Grabowski explicitly pledged us to secrecy and told us we were obligated to refuse to give evidence about this to anyone. Soon after this discussion in Grabowski’s office, I was enjoined once again by Frau Dr. Wernicke in the doctors’ room of our station not to say anything to anybody about my knowledge of the killing operation. For this reason I did not dare to speak with anyone at all about the incidents in Obrawalde.

. . .As I mentioned before, it was not my affiliation with the party, but my subordinate relationship as a nurse and especially as a civil servant that obligated and compelled me to follow all the orders that Frau Dr. Wernicke gave me.

To the question of whether a refusal was perhaps possible, I must say that I did not dare to refuse. I always believed that if I refused, I would have to count on being sent to a concentration camp or some similar place.

. . .I acted only on the orders of the head physician Dr. Wernicke, and I was always under a certain obligation, which I really wanted to get out of, but was unable to. Of course I understood that what was happening in Obrawalde was wrong. But the assistance and the duties I had to perform there belonged to my profession, which I had pursued for many years, and which had become a part of me. I did not see any possibility of evading the orders of the head physician. As I performed each task, whether it was transferring patients or administering medication, I had certain inhibitions, and I really did not do anything willingly or on my own. The obligation and the duty to carry out everything as ordered was always hanging over me. The environment in which we lived as nurses was the world of the mentally ill. We hardly ever left the institution; we had a great deal of work to do and hardly had any contact with the outside world. . . .

Citation

4 An anesthetic, a substance that reduces sensitivity to pain.
5 A brand of Barbital, a hypnotic sleep aid.

Source 5 – Law for the Protection against Hereditarily Diseased Offspring, 1933 (28:05)

Excerpt

Article 1: Sterilization and Hereditary Disease

(1) Any person with a hereditary disease may be rendered infertile if, according to the judgment of medical science, procreation by said person is likely to produce children who suffer from serious physical or mental hereditary defects.

(2) A person with a hereditary disease is defined by this law as anyone who suffers from one of the following illnesses:

1. Congenital feeblemindedness
2. Schizophrenia
3. [Manic-depressive] insanity
4. Hereditary epilepsy
5. Hereditary Huntington’s chorea
6. Hereditary blindness
7. Hereditary deafness
8. Extreme hereditary physical deformity . . . .

Article 12: Direct Compulsion

(1) Once the court order for sterilization has been finalized, [the procedure] must be performed even without the consent of the patient to be sterilized, unless said person initiated the petition himself. The administrating physician shall be responsible for requesting necessary law enforcement measures from the department of police. Should these measures prove insufficient, the use of force shall be permitted.

Citation

Source 6 – An anonymous letter from a gay man to the Reich bishop, 1935 (30:25)

Excerpt

Reverend Reich Bishop,

I no longer know what to do, and so I am turning my steps directly to you. May God grant that this letter comes directly into your hands! May God grant that you do not close your mind to these lines but that you do everything in your power to put an end to the horror, by protesting at the very top and asking for help in this matter.

Reich Bishop, before I describe everything, I solemnly assure you that I have either myself experienced [what I report here] or it has been reported to me by trustworthy people who have themselves lived through the terror of it all; let me say that it is hard for me to be completely open in describing all these things, with all the hideous words as well—but that it has to be so that you can have a clear picture and take action with all the power of your exalted office.

In the past half year, in Berlin and throughout the Reich, roundups have been made of homosexuals or people suspected of being homosexual. They have either been taken from pubs (as half a year ago) or pursued at home, in the street, and so on. . . After they have been picked up and kept standing for twelve hours and more in the corridors of the Gestapo, without being given a chance to eat or drink anything at all, they are either released or taken to the so-called Columbia Haus (Tempelhof ). . .The way in which the SS guards treated the detainees was appalling. They kicked people on the shins, screaming and raging as if they had to deal with serious criminals behaving in a stubborn and troublesome manner. (In fact, everyone was so intimidated that they did not utter a word and followed all the guards’ orders!) Curses. . . could be heard all the time. A few complaints by some of the older men were answered with blows. The boss of the operation, one Obersturmführer (senior storm leader) Meisinger, did not do anything to stop this dreadful treatment; on the contrary, he put in some bellowing of his own from time to time and thus underlined the way his subordinates were behaving.

Such was the way people were treated at the Gestapo [jail] in Prinz-Albert-Straße. But much more dreadful (still today!!) is the treatment of those held in the so-called Columbia Haus, which is already known in Berlin as “Death Island” and the “Prussian Siberia.” The poor people there are tortured for weeks and months on end. (Mentally and physically!). . .

Many prisoners have been beaten every day in the Columbia Haus, although they have done absolutely nothing wrong. A very large number of those held in the Columbia Haus are subsequently sent to the Lichtenburg concentration camp. Hardly anyone can describe what they do there to homosexuals and people suspected of being homosexuals. Not only do they use the foulest swearwords with the prisoners, they maltreat them in the most brutal way (allegedly on orders from above, although I simply cannot believe it!) . . . .

For all inmates of the concentration camp, the openly held beatings are a terrible experience. Every last man has to fall in, stand still, and watch while fifty to one hundred blows are rained on a poor creature. (The cries and the sight of flowing blood are terrible experiences for those who have to watch!) For some trivial matter or other, people have inflicted on them every conceivable punishment in which the sadistic character expresses itself. The darkness down in the so-called bunker is absolutely terrible. A number of people have already gone mad there.

Reverend Reich Bishop! These prisoners are people who have landed there because of some sexual inclination or even simply because they are suspected of it. But not a single one has appeared before a judge! (Some are due to be tried for the first time in the next few weeks!) . . . .

The tortures are continuing. As you read these lines, many hundreds are undergoing the most hideous torments. Reich Bishop, if someone has committed an offense, he should be brought before a judge where he can answer for it! That is the view of all decent Germans. But here people are being tortured and maltreated who, for the most part, have not acknowledged or committed a single punishable offense. . . .

People have said that our glorious Führer would punish such acts most severely if they came to his ears. I am of the same view, for Adolf Hitler wishes to see the realization of justice and the most heartfelt love of one’s neighbor. . . Please, make your own inquiries as soon as possible, but in such a way that you learn the whole truth! The guilty ones must be brought to account . . . .

For fear of revenge (I have my grounds!), I cannot tell you my name, Reverend Reich Bishop. Forgive me for not giving you my name, but it is not possible otherwise. Our Lord be with you. May he bless you in all you do!

Heil Hitler!

One who suffers greatly in the present state of things.

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Source 7 – Policy and Operations Concerning Jews in the Occupied Territories, 1939 (36:35)

Excerpt

The Chief of the Security Police Berlin, September 21, 1939

Schnellbrief [Express Mail]

To Chiefs of all Einsatzgruppen [Nazi deployment groups] of the Security Police

Subject: Jewish Question in Occupied Territory

I refer to the conference held in Berlin today, and again point out that the planned total measures (i.e., Endziel [the final aim]) are to be kept strictly secret.

Distinction must be made between:

1. the final aim (which will require extended periods of time) and
2. the stages leading to the fulfillment of this final aim (which will be carried out in short periods). . . . .

For the time being, the first prerequisite for the final aim is the concentration of the Jews from the countryside into the larger cities.

This is to be carried out speedily. . . . .

As far as possible. . . [certain] areas. . . are to be cleared of Jews; at least the aim should be to establish only a few cities of concentration. In [other areas], as few concentration centers as possible are to be set up, so as to facilitate subsequent measures. In this connection it should be borne in mind that only cities which are rail junctions, or are at least located on railroad lines, should be selected as concentration points.

On principle, Jewish communities of less than 500 persons are to be dissolved and transferred to the nearest concentration center. . . . .

Councils of Jewish Elders

(1) In each Jewish community, a Council of Jewish Elders is to be set up which, as far as possible, is to be composed of the remaining authoritative personalities and rabbis. . . . .

The Council is to be composed of up to 24 male Jews (depending on the size of the Jewish community).

The Council is to be made fully responsible, in the literal sense of the word, for the exact and prompt implementation of directives already issued or to be issued in the future. . . . .

The Jewish Councils (Judenräte) are to carry out an approximate census of the Jews of their areas. . . The results are to be reported in the shortest possible time.

(4) The Councils of Elders are to be informed of the date and time of the evacuation, the means available for evacuation, and, finally, the departure routes. They are then to be made personally responsible for the evacuation of the Jews from the countryside.

For reasons of general police security, the concentration of the Jews in the cities will probably call for regulations in these cities that will forbid their entry to certain quarters completely and that—but with due regard to economic requirements—they may, for instance, not leave the ghetto, nor leave their homes after a certain hour in the evening, etc. . . . .

The High Command of the Army; the Plenipotentiary for the Four-Year Plan (attention: Secretary of State Neumann), the Reich Ministry for the Interior (attention: State Secretary Stuckart), for Food and the Economy (attention: State Secretary Landfried), as well as the Chiefs of Civil Administration of the Occupied Territories have received copies of this decree.

signed Heydrich

Citation

Source 8 – Dawid Sierakowiak’s Notebooks from the Łódź Ghetto, 1942 (41:25)

Excerpt

Friday, September 4. Łódź.

Yesterday’s tragic news has turned out to be unfortunately true. The Germans are demanding all the children up to age ten, the elderly over sixty-five, and all other sick, swollen invalids, people unable to work, and those without employment. The panic in the city is incredible. Nobody’s working anywhere; everyone’s running to secure work assignments for those in their family who are unemployed;⁷ parents of the unfortunate children are trying to save them by any means. The Registration Office was sealed after the lists were made, so that all rescue attempts by falsifying birth certificates, registration books, and other documents, or making up death certificates, etc. are failing. Incredible scenes were taking place in our Arbeitseinsatz [forced labor internment]. Work assignments were issued in great haste, even though they already say that our efforts don’t matter because there will be a general Szpera [curfew], during which medical commissions will examine everyone to decide on their ability to work.

Today, despite incredible difficulties, I managed as a clerk to get a work assignment for Mom in the furniture workshop. Even so, I am very worried about Mom because she’s terribly emaciated, shrunken, and weak. Nevertheless, she still works in the garden most of the time, is not sick, and even cooks, cleans, and, if there’s need, does laundry at home.

Early in the morning, the office of the School Department was registering eight- and ten-year-old children for work, but at twelve it was announced that the lists had been invalidated. . . . .

The mood of panic is intensifying by the second. All kinds of rumors are repeated from lips to lips that we should expect the worst. At four, Rumkowski⁸ and [Dawid] Warszawski, the supreme director of a number of workshops, gave speeches on Firemen’s Square (13 Lutomierska Street). They said that “the sacrifice of the children and the elderly is necessary,” that “nothing could be done to prevent it,” and asked us “not to hinder carrying out the deportation action.”⁹ It was easy for them to say that because they managed to secure from the Germans exemption from the deportation for children of workshop directors, firemen, policemen, doctors, instructors, the Beirat [advisory council], and the Devil knows who else. In addition, all kinds of connections will be set in motion now (thousands of the well-connected elderly, the sick, and children will receive in their place completely different persons who, though able to work, will nevertheless be sacrificed to make up for the “connected” children and elderly).

Father’s cousin, who has a three-year-old girl and wants to save her, came to us in the evening. We’ve agreed to let her stay with her child, and even to let her whole family come down. They were afraid to stay at their home, not to be taken hostages for the child. As a result of the heat outside and stuffiness at home, which is caused by the presence of so many people, I could hardly fall asleep.

Citation

Notes

For more children’s narratives from the Lodz ghetto, see https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/give-me-your-children-voices-from-the-lodz-ghetto.

6 The Polish word Łódz ́is spelled Lodz in English
7 Those who had certain work assignments that the Nazis deemed necessary were sometimes permitted to delay their deportation or were spared from being killed temporarily.
8 Mordechai Chaim Rumkowski, the head of the Jewish Council of Elders in the Łódź Ghetto appointed by Nazi Germany during the German occupation of Poland. Rumkowski is a controversial figure, and historians debate his role in the Holocaust.
9 Rumkowski is remembered for his speech Give Me Your Children, delivered at a time when the Germans demanded his compliance with the deportation of 20,000 children to Chełmno extermination camp.

Source 9 – Stefania Staszewska’s Warsaw Ghetto Diary, 1944 (47:35)

Excerpt

It’s already started inside the big ghetto. We can hear the sound of fighting. Here on Leszno Street things are still quiet. It’s warm; the sky is clear, studded with stars. I’m standing in the courtyard, listening. The shooting intensifies, then grows quiet. When will it be our turn?

The authorities posted their decrees all over the streets early in the morning: The last transports for the Többens and Schultz factories¹⁰ will take place tomorrow at 7 a.m. Anyone who stays will be shot.

Outside the ghetto, army units are cordoning off the walls. Gendarmes have been called in to reinforce the sentries. We make our final preparations and set up our chain of contacts. Lots of running around. On the street I meet up with Bernard—he’s in the bunker with Róźka. We talk for a minute, then shake hands with heartfelt emotion. I ask myself whether we’ll ever see each other again. Before evening I make the rounds of my friends. We say our farewells; they have decided to report for deportation.

Today no one will be able to get out. Suddenly the streets are empty but for the sound of the gendarmes’ [armed police] boots beating the cobblestones. I turn around. They’re marching straight toward us, and the way back has been cut off. The Germans are rounding up everyone waiting to pass through the checkpoint, including me. They aren’t letting any of the off-site workers through. I’m furious at myself for not making it back to my people in time.

The Germans shout, “You’re trying to escape! We’ll take care of you bandits right this minute.” They line us up—thirty to forty people—in ranks of four. They lead us outside the ghetto and herd us down Zelazna Street to the Befehlsstelle [command post]. That’s bad. We know what they do to people there. I’m too mad at myself for getting caught to be afraid. How could I be so stupid? One boy tries to escape and takes a series of bullets in the stomach. He runs a few more meters, curling up like a cat. He’s writhing with pain; the Germans order us to carry him by his arms and legs to the Befehlsstelle. We wait next to the wall for the end, men on one side, women on the other. The wounded boy is howling with pain; his brother asks the Germans to put him out of his misery but they just laugh. “You’ll all look like that in a minute.”

The day is hot, the sunlight stings our eyes. I stare at the walls and listen. I can make out shots from around Nowolipie [street]. There are only a few dozen meters between me and the wall, but they are insurmountable. Some armored cars drive up. The Germans unload ammunition, set up their heavy guns, ready themselves for the siege. All these tanks and cannons, their whole army armed to the teeth—all mobilized against our pistols, grenades, and fire bombs.

I know our side won’t give up easily; our people are ready to fight to the last, their only thought is to fell as many Germans as possible, to do their little part in the struggle for freedom, for human dignity.

I’m standing on Zelazna waiting to be executed, completely numb, surrounded by barking Germans. Some are yelling to shoot us right away; others want to take us to the transport. I hear the words Lager Poniatów.¹¹ And all of a sudden we’re marching in double step along the walls, down the Aryan side of Lezno and Karmelicka [streets]. I see the Poles’ horrified faces; the Germans chase them away.

We pass through the space between the ghettos, and finally we’re in the big ghetto, which is full of army troops, gendarmes, shooting, and, in some places, fires. Near Niska Street we see a burned-out German tank. Hurrah! It’s worth being alive just to see that. The Germans are cowering, they’re creeping along the walls; they’re afraid, afraid of the “Jewish bandits.” Angrily they prod us on with their rifle butts, shouting “Schnell, schnell!” [Fast! Fast!] We’re already at Umschlagplatz.¹² The freight cars are packed, they load us on. We stand, jammed together, and listen. The sound of the fighting grows louder and louder.

Later, during the night, as the train carries us into the unknown, we see a light above Warsaw, a great bloody glow. The ghetto is fighting; the ghetto is burning. Does the world see that glow?

Citation

10 Nazi German textile manufacturing factories which made German uniforms, socks and garments in the Warsaw Ghetto and elsewhere using enslaved Jewish workers.
11 The Poniatowa camp, located in the Polish town of Poniatowa was initially a camp for prisoners of war and then became a Nazi forced labor camp.
12 These were holding areas near railway stations in occupied Poland where Jews who were deported from ghettos were assembled in order to be sent to death camps.

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