The Ghetto Fights Read online

  In mid-May 1942, 110 prisoners of the so-called Central Jail ("Gesiowka"), arrested for illegal crossing to the "Aryan side", were executed. One of our comrades (Grylak) saw the prisoners being led out of the jail and into special trucks. Almost all of them walked meekly into the cars, when suddenly one woman found courage to show her protest. From the steps of the truck she shouted: "I shall die, but your death will be much worse!" Special proclamations signed by Dr. Auerswald informed the ghetto of the "just" punishment received by the 110 "criminals".

  At about this time another of our major "slip-ups" occurred. The Germans discovered the apartment where our printing shop was installed. They did not find anybody there, however, because our intelligence service had known about the German order to search the house 24 hours beforehand and as a result we had had ample time to move our paper supply, the mimeograph machine, and the typewriters to another safe place.

  The mood of the ghetto was now changing daily. The turning point in the ghetto, however, was April 18th. Until that day, no matter how difficult life had been, the ghetto inhabitants felt that their everyday life, the very foundations of their existence, were based on something stabilized and durable; that one could try to balance one's budget or make preparations for the winter. On April 18th the very basis of ghetto life started to move from under people's feet. Every night filled with the shrill, crisp sound of shots was an illustration that the ghetto had no foundations whatever, that it lived at the will of the Germans, that it was brittle and weak like a house built of playing cards. By now everybody understood that the ghetto was to be liquidated, but nobody yet realized that its entire population was destined to die.

  By mid-July the black clouds became thicker. Appearances were normal enough. Only "unikely" rumours began to circulate--about the arrival of the UmsiedIungskommando (Deportation Board), about the proposed deportation of 20,000, 40,000, 60,000 ghetto inhabitants, about taking all the jobless for fortification works, about leaving in Warsaw only those who were actually employed. These rumours, although still considered implausible, caused uneasiness, then panic. Great numbers of people started looking for work, tried to obtain employment in factories and public offices. Ladies who, until then, had been spending their days in cafes, overnight became hard-working seamstresses, menders, clerks. Some shops gave preference to those in possession of sewing machines. The price of sewing machines immediately rose. Although no definite information was forthcoming, people became more and more panicky and willingly started paying larger sums for a chance to work. "To obtain work" was, at that time, the only topic of conversation, the only thought. Everybody had to work. Those "established" were happy--a load was off their minds. The "unestablished"--uneasy, irritated--followed every lead which might bring them employment.

  On July 20th the arrests began. Almost all doctors of the "Czyste" Hospital were locked up in the Pawiak Prison, as were part of the Jewish Mutual Aid Committee's managing personnel and several Community councilmen (among others, J. Jaszunski). That the ghetto would shortly be liquidated was obvious.

  On July 22nd, 1942, at 10 a.m., German cars halted at the Jewish Council buildings. The "Umsiedlungsstab" members entered the house. At a short meeting the Judenrat members were told the Germans' desire. It was really a simple matter: all "unproductive" Jews were to be deported somewhere to the East.

  The Germans departed and another secret meeting took place. Not a single councilman stopped to consider the basic question--whether the Jewish Council should undertake to carry out the order at all. The Secretary of the Jewish Council addressed the meeting: "Gentlemen, before you pass to the technical means of executing the order, stop and think--should it be done?" But his advice was not heeded. There was no debate on the implications of the order, only on matters of procedure for its execution.

  The following morning large white posters signed by the Judenrat (the text of the proclamation was dictated by Oberscharfuhrer Hoefle) made it clear to the Jewish population that all, with the exception of those working for Germans (here followed a carefully prepared list of all working places which the order did not concern), employees of the Jewish Council and the ZSS (Jewish Mutual Aid), would have to leave Warsaw. The Jewish police was designated as the agency to execute the deportation order, and its Command was to keep in touch with the "Umsiedlungsstab". Thus the Germans made the Jewish Council itself condemn over 300,000 ghetto inhabitants to death.

  On the first day of the deportation period 2,000 prisoners of the Central Jail were sent out together with a few hundred beggars and starvelings who had been caught in the streets.

  In the afternoon a meeting of our "instructors' five" took place. We decided that in view of the complete lack of weapons and, therefore, the impossibility of offering resistance, our activities should be directed at saving from deportation as many people as possible. We thought that contacts maintained by certain welfare organizations with people within the Jewish police--the agency in charge of the deportation procedure--would prove helpful. However, even before the end of the meeting and before the final details had been worked out, we learned that the Germans and Ukrainians themselves had surrounded the Muranowska Street--Niska Street block, that they were attending to the "technical details" themselves, and that they had already taken from these buildings over 2,000 people, the number lacking to fill the daily quota. (This quota was, in the first days of the deportation, 6,000 people per day). According to this report, the Germans took everybody without discrimination. Even those in possession of certificates from German places of employment had to come along (L. Rozensztajn perished in this manner). In view of the new developments our plans seemed quite unrealistic.

  On the second day, July 23rd, a meeting of the so-called Workers' Committee took place. All political parties were represented on the Committee. Our group, supported only by the Hechalutz and Hashomer organization, called for active resistance. But public opinion was against us. The majority still thought such action provocative and maintained that if the required contingent of Jews could be delivered, the remainder of the ghetto would be left in peace. The instinct for self-preservation finally drove the people into a state of mind permitting them to disregard the safety of others in order to save their own necks. True, nobody as yet believed that the deportation meant death. But the Germans had already succeeded in dividing the Jewish population into two distinct groups--those already condemned to die and those who still hoped to remain alive. Afterwards, step by step, the Germans will succeed in pitting these two groups against one another and cause some Jews to lead others to certain death in order to save their own skin.

  During the first days of the "actions", the Party Council sat in continuous session (Orzech, Abrasha Blum, Berek Sznajdmil, Sonia Nowogrodzka, Bernard Goldsztejn, Klog, Paw, Grylak, Mermelsztajn, Kersz, Wojland, Russ, Marek Edelman, and a comrade from the Polish Socialists). We were awaiting the arrival of weapons at any hour then. Our youth groups were all ready. For three days until the time when all hopes to obtain the promised weapons had to be given up, a state of "acute emergency" for our mobilized groups prevailed. All our other members were also mobilized and concentrated at several designated spots awaiting orders. Such was the feeling of excitement and apprehension that several street fights with members of the Jewish police who were taking part in the "action" took place.

  On the second day of the "deportations" the Chairman of the Jewish Council, Adam Czerniakow, committed suicide. He knew beyond any doubt that the supposed "deportation to the East" actually meant the death of hundreds and thousands of people in gas chambers, and he refused to assume responsibility for it. Being unable to counteract events he decided to quit altogether. At the time, however, we thought that he had no right to act as he did. We thought that since he was the only person in the ghetto whose voice carried a great deal of authority, it had been his duty to inform the entire population of the real state of affairs, and also to dissolve all public institutions, particularly the Jewish police, which had been est
ablished by the Jewish Council and was legally subordinate to it.

  The same day the first issue of our paper On Guard, in which we warned the population not to volunteer for deportation, and called for resistance, appeared. "Utterly helpless as we are," Comrade Orzech wrote in the editorial, "we must not let ourselves be caught. Fight against it with all means at your disposal!" This issue, published in three times the usual number of copies, was circulated throughout the ghetto during the fourth and fifth days of the deportation action.

  So that we might learn conclusively and in detail about the fate of the human transports leaving the ghetto, Zalmen Frydrych (Zygmunt) was ordered to follow one of the transports to the "Aryan side". His journey "to the East", however, was a short one, for it took only three days. Immediately after leaving the ghetto walls he established contact with an employee of the Warsaw Danzig [Gdanski] Terminal working on the Warsaw--Malkinia line. They travelled together in the transport's wake to Sokolow where, Zygmunt was told by local railroad men, the tracks forked out, one branch leading to Treblinka. It proved that every day a freight train carrying people from Warsaw travelled in that direction and invariably returned empty. No transports of food were ever seen on this line. Civilians were forbidden to approach the Treblinka railroad station.

  This in itself was conclusive proof that the people brought to Treblinka were being exterminated somewhere in the vicinity. In addition, Zygmunt met two fugitives from the death camp the following morning. They were two Jews, completely stripped of their clothes, and Zygmunt met them on the Sokolow market place and obtained the full details of the horrible procedure. Thus it was not any longer a question of rumours, but of facts established by eyewitness accounts (one of the fugitives was our comrade Wallach).

  After Zygmunt's return we published the second issue of On Guard with a detailed description of Treblinka. But even now the population stubbornly refused to believe the truth. They simply closed their eyes to the unpleasant facts and fought against them with all the means at their disposal.

  In the meantime the Germans, not too discriminating in their choice of methods, introduced a new propaganda twist. They promised--and actually gave--three kilograms of bread and one kilogram of marmalade to everyone who voluntarily registered for "deportation". The offer was more than sufficient. Once the bait was thrown, propaganda and hunger did the rest. The propaganda value of the measure lay in the fact that it was truly an excellent argument against the "stories" about gas chambers ("why would they be giving bread away if they intended to murder them?..."). The hunger, an even stronger persuader, magnified the picture of three brown, crusty loaves of bread until nothing was visible beyond it. Their taste which one could almost feel in one's mouth--it was only a short walk from one's home to the "Umschlagplatz" from which the cars left--blinded people to all the other things at the end of the same road. Their smell, familiar, delicious, befogged one's mind, made it unable to grasp the things which would normally have been so very obvious. There were times when hundreds of people had to wait on line for several days to be "deported". The number of people anxious to obtain the three kilograms of bread was such that the transports, now leaving twice daily with 12,000 people, could not accommodate them all.

  The noose around the ghetto was now becoming tighter and tighter. After a short period of time all of the so-called "Little Ghetto" (the neighbourhood of Twarda and Pahska Streets) had been emptied of all its inhabitants. In ten days all "volunteers", children's homes ("Korczak's Children"), and refugee shelters were shipped out, and the systematic "blockades" of city blocks and streets began. People with knapsacks would escape from street to street, trying to guess in advance the area of the next "blockade", and stay away from it.

  The gendarmes, Ukrainians and Jewish police cooperate nicely. The roles are meticulously and precisely divided. The gendarmes surround the streets; the Ukrainians, in front of the gendarmes, encircle the houses closely; the Jewish police walk into the courtyards and summon all the inhabitants. "All Jews must come down. 30 kilograms of baggage allowed. Those remaining inside shall be shot..." And once again the same summons. People run from all staircases. Nervously, on the run, they clothe themselves in whatever is handy. Some descend as they are, sometimes straight from bed, others are carrying everything they can possibly take along, knapsacks, packages, pots and pans. People cast frightened glances at one another, the worst has happened. Trembling, they form groups in front of the house. They are not allowed to talk but they still try to gain the policemen's pity. From nearby houses similar groups of trembling, completely exhausted people arrive and form into one long column. A gendarme beckons with his rifle to a casual passer-by who, having been warned too late, was unable to escape the doomed street. A Jewish policeman pulls him by his sleeve or by his neck into the column in front of the house. If the policeman is half-way decent, he hides a small piece of paper with the scribbled address of the victim's family--to let them know... Now the deserted houses, the apartment entrances ajar according to regulations, are given a quick once-over by the Ukrainians. They open closed apartments with a single kick of their heavy boots, with a single blow of a rifle butt. Two, three shots signify the death of those few who did not heed the call and remained in their homes. The "blockade" is finished. On somebody's table an unfinished cup of tea gets cold, flies finish somebody's piece of bread.

  People outside of the "blockaded" area hopelessly look for relatives and friends among the rectangular groups surrounded by Ukrainians and Jewish policemen. The columns slowly march through the streets. Behind them, in a single row, requisitioned "rikshas" carry the old and the children.

  It is a long way to the "Umschlag". The Deportation Point, from which the cars leave, is situated on the very edge of the ghetto, on Stawki Street. The tall walls surrounding it and closely guarded by gendarmes are broken at only one narrow place. Through this entrance the groups of helpless, powerless people are brought in. Everyone holds some papers, working certificates, identification cards. The gendarme at the entrance looks them over briefly. "Rechts"--means life, "links"--means death. Although everyone knows in advance the futility of all arguments, he still tries to show his particular helpfulness to German industry, to his German master, and hopes for the magic little order, "rechts". The gendarme does not even listen. Sometimes he orders the passing people to show him their hands--he chooses all small ones: "rechts"; sometimes he separates blondes: "links"; in the morning he favours short people; in the evening he takes a liking to tall ones. "Links", "links", "links".

  The human torrent grows, deepens, floods the square, floods three large three-storey buildings, former schools. More people are assembled here than are necessary to fill the next four days' quota, they are just being brought in as "reserves". People wait four or five days before they are loaded into the railroad cars. People fill every inch of free space, crowd the buildings, bivouac in empty rooms, hallways, on the stairs. Dirty, slimy mud floods the floors. One's foot sinks in human excrement at every step. The odour of sweat and urine sticks in one's throat. There are no panes in the windows, and the nights are cold. Some are dressed only in night-shirts or house-coats.

  On the second day hunger begins to twist the stomach in painful spasms, cracked lips long for a drop of water. The times when people were given three loaves of bread are long since gone. Sweating, feverish children lie helplessly in their mothers'arms. People seem to shrink, become smaller, greyer.

  All eyes have a wild, crazy, fearful look. People look pale, helpless, desperate. There is a sudden flash of revelation that soon the worst, the incredible, the thing one would not believe to the very last moment is bound to happen. Here, in this crowded square, all the continually nursed illusions collapse, all the brittle hopes that "maybe I may save myself and my dearest ones from total destruction"... collapse. A nightmare settles on one's chest, grips one's throat, shoves one's eyes out of their sockets, opens one's mouth to a soundless cry. An old man imploringly and feverishly hangs on to strangers ar
ound him. A helplessly suffering mother presses three children to her heart. One wants to yell, but there is nobody to yell to; to implore, to argue--there is nobody to argue with; one is alone, completely alone in this multitudinous crowd. One can almost feel the ten--nay, hundred, thousand--rifles aimed at one's heart. The figures of the Ukrainians grow to gigantic proportions. And then one does not know of anything any more, does not think about anything, one sits down dully in a corner, right in the mud and dung of the wet floor. The air becomes more and more stuffy, the place becomes more and more crowded, not because of the thousands of bodies and the odour of the rooms, but because of the sudden understanding that all is lost, that nothing can be done, that one must perish.

  Possibilities of leaving the "Umschlag" did exist, but they were a drop in the sea of the thousands awaiting help. The Germans themselves established these possibilities when they transferred a small children's hospital from the Little Ghetto into one of the "Umschlag" buildings and opened an emergency aid station there--a malicious gesture toward those sentenced to death. Twice daily, in the morning and in the evening, the personnel working in the aid station was changed. All the aid station workers were clad in white coats and all were issued working certificates. Thus it was sufficient to dress somebody in a white coat to enable him to be taken out with the crew of doctors and nurses. Some nurses took strange children into their arms and walked out with them claiming they were their own. With older people the matter was more difficult. These could only be sent to the cemetery or to a hospital for adults situated outside the enclosure, a procedure likewise sanctioned by the Germans for no apparent reason. Thus, healthy people were smuggled out of the "Umschlag ground" in ambulances and in coffins. After a while, however, the Germans began to check the ambulances and the condition of the "sick". Therefore, in order to show undeniable evidence, those old men and women whose death was slated to be temporarily postponed by virtue of somebody's intervention or as a personal favour, were brought to a small room in the aid station, behind the reception room. Here their legs were broken without anaesthesia.