When and how arrived different groups of children to the Kinderheim in Bergen-Belsen?

Yehuda Danzig in the dark cap on the right, and his brother Michal, behind him in the light cap. Both from Zlate Moravce, Czechoslovakia. Danzig brothers, who were from Zlate Moravce, Slovakia, arrived at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in August 1944. They survived several transit and labor camps and a death march. Photo from the movie from the Imperial War Museum. London.

One of the questions I was trying to solve when writing this book was How and when Kinderheim in Barack 211 was created? Two different approaches to solve the question could be applied. One, was to investigate when "the Staff" of Kinderheim arrived to Bergen-Belsen. The second, was to investigate when different groups of children or children with mothers arrived to this special hut in the Womens Camp.

It is known that several female inmates, among others, Luba Tryszynska that was the woman in charge in the Kinderheim in Bergen-Belsen, was moved together with Hermina Krantzová and Ada Bimko from Auschwitz concentration camp to Bergen-Belsen. Luba Tryszynska was deported to Auschwitz in January 1943. She was separated from her husband Herschel and Luba’s 3-year-old son Isaac. Both husband and son were murdered in gas chambers. It is known that in the summer of 1944 Luba was transferred from Auschwitz to Bergen-Belsen so that it might be the beginning of the Kinderheim.

There were three main groups of children in the Kinderheim in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. Approximately 50 Dutch children, according to the list 57, described as children of diamond workers that were separated from their parents and sent to Kinderheim in Bergen-Belsen while parents were sent to two other camps. 30-50 children were from Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia, Romania, Slovakia and Holland. There were also Yugoslavian children and German children registered later by UNRRA both as German and stateless.

Numerous children from the group from Poland were originally imprisoned in the Piotrków Ghetto that was actually the first ghetto created in occupied Poland.

Arrival and history of Dutch children - December 4-5, 1945
The story of Dutch children starts in December of 1944, exactly the date is not known. Probably December 4-5, 1944 as on that date their parents were deported from Bergen-Belsen to other camps. Woman and men, parents of the Dutch children were separately sent to two different camps. According to testimonies, 54 (57) crying children were abandoned in a snowy field behind the Kinderheim barrack. That must be on December 5th, the day they were separated from their parents that were deported from Bergen-Belsen.

It is possible that the children came

Dutch children fate was described by one of the oldest Dutch children Esther Werkendam, later known as Hetty Verolme. She was assigned to the Dutch children's group as a helper. She was later described as a Little mother. Two of her younger brothers were also in this group. After the liberation she said det she was for 14 months in Bergen-Belsen. That means that the day of the deportation from Westerbork on the pink registration cards, see photo, is right. It is known that later, she and her two brothers were separated from their parents that were thereafter further deported to two other camps.

"Diamantairs"was a comprehensive 213 group of people of Jewish diamond workers and traders, mainly from Amsterdam, who came to Bergen-Belsen together with their family members in mid-May 1944 from from Westerbork transit kamp. Germans wanted to build own diamond industry. However, when these plans crashed due to to lack of raw material. Men of the Diamantairs group were sent on December 4, 1944, to Sachsenhausen concentration camp and women on December 5 to Helmstedt-Beendorf camp that wa a satellite camp of Neuengame concentration camp. Their 57 children that remained in Bergen-Belsen were loaded on the truck and driven från the hut number 17 in Stalag to barrack 211, called Kinderheim in Women's Camp.

From August 1944, up to 2,500 mostly German, Soviet, Polish and French female prisoners also arrived on several transports from Ravensbrück concentration camp to work in Beendorf in the context of the Jägerstab (“Fighter Staff”). The Jägerstab had been established by the Ministry of Armaments and War Production in March 1944 under the leadership of SS-Obergruppenführer Hans Kammler, an architect, to coordinate the relocation of production facilities critical to the war effort in order to protect them from bomb attacks. The female prisoners produced munitions for the air force as well as parts (autopilots, controls, steering gears, etc.) for the Me 262 aircraft and the V1 and V2 rockets. The prisoners worked for 12 hours a day on the machines, which were between 425 and 465 metres underground. The women were lowered down the shaft in small cages.

The relocation projects for Askania Werke AG from Berlin and the Hakenfelde GmbH aeronautical equipment plant to the “Marie” (Beendorf) and “Bartensleben” (Morsleben) tunnels were given the code names “Bulldogge” and “Iltis”.

On 10 April 1945, both men and woman camp in Helmstedt-Beendorf were evacuated, and the women and men were loaded onto cattle wagons and taken via Magdeburg, Stendal and Wittenberge to the Wöbbelin “reception camp”, which they reached on 16 April. The men stayed there but the women continued on. Their train stopped for three days at the railway station in Sülstorf in Mecklenburg, and the many women who died there of starvation and thirst were hastily buried by the inhabitants of the village. On 20 or 21 April, the train reached Hamburg and the prisoners were distributed to the largely empty Hamburg satellite camps of Eidelstedt, Langenhorn, Sasel and Wandsbek. Most of the prisoners were able to leave Hamburg on train on 1 May, which took the women Padborg in Denmark and then to Malmö in Sweden. That was the way som of the women from the Diamantairs group in Bergen-Belsen landed in Sweden.

The story of Dutch Diamond children starts in December of 1944, exactly the date is not known. Probably December 5, 1944 as this is a day on the list shown above. According to testimonies, 54 crying children were abandoned in a snowy field behind the Kinderheim barrack. Here on the list there are 57 children. None of the children that came to Sweden with UNRRAs White Boat mission are listed above. Esther Werekendam and her brothers are number 26, 27 and 54.

Dutch Jews registrations cards. Here of Werkendam family. The date of the holder’s deportation to a concentration camp written in red pencil. There is a similar registration card of Anne Frank. The cards include name, address, date of birth, profession, marital status, family composition and, in three out of four cases, the date of their transport to a concentration camp written in red pencil. The cards ended up with the Dutch Red Cross where after the war they were used to locate missing persons. Jews in the Netherlands had been forced to selectively register as Jews from 1941. Esther Werkendam, later known as hetty Verolme, wrote the book about the fate of Diamond Children. Hetty’s family was like most of the Dutch Jews rounded up by the Nazi’s and sent to Westerbork camp. It is likely that they, according to their pink cards, were sent on February 1, 1944 (red pencil note BB 1. 2. 44) cross their cards) to Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. There Esther (Hetty) and her brothers were seperated from their parents and sent to the Kinderheim, Children’s House, within Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. As one of the eldest in the group of Dutch children, Hetty became the “Little Mother”, helping to care for not only her siblings, but the other children as well.


Dutch Jews registrations cards. Here of the mother in Werkendam family, Hendrika. In the top right corner there is a registration date 29.9.43 at Wbk, Westerbork transit camp. The date of deportation to  concentration camp Bergen-Belsen is written in red pencil BB 1. 2. 44 (February 2, 1944). There is a similar registration card of Anne Frank. The card include name, address, date of birth, profession, marital status, family composition. The cards to start with were issued by Judenrat were used by Germans and after the war ended up with the Dutch Red Cross and were used to locate missing persons. At the bottom line there is a notation of the first address of Werkendam Hendrika after WWII. 

Werkendam family prior WWII. On the left Esther Werkendam with her parents. In 1943 the entire Werkendam family, father, mother, Esther and her two brothers was deported from Amsterdam to the Westerbork camp that was a kind of durch - through camp. Later they were deported to concentration camps.

In 1943 the entire Werkendam family was deported from Amsterdam to the Westerbork camp that was a kind of durch - through camp. It is known that from July 1942 to September 1944 transport trains arrived regularly at Westerbork once or twice a week, every Tuesday. By other trains, this time mostly in cattle wagons, an estimated 97 776 Jews were deported from Westerbork during the period. 65 train-loads totaling 60,330 people were deported in waves to Auschwitz concentration camp, 19 train-loads with 34 313 people to Sobibor,  9 train-loads; 4,894 people left for Theresienstadt ghetto, and Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. Almost all of Jews deported to Auschwitz and Sobibor perished. Most of the former inmates of Westerbork that survived were these deported to Bergen-Belsen. Among deported to. Bergen-Belsen was Werkendam family. After arrival in Bergen-Belsen the family was torn apart. They survived in three different camps and reunited in Netherlands shortly after the end of WWII. At Bergen-Belsen, Esther and her two brothers were sent to Barrack 211, also known as the Children's House - Kinderheim. 

It was just 500 meters between hut number 17 where Dimond children lived with their parents and hut 211 - Kinderheim in the Womens camp.

Numerous women fall ill after eating food from the British liberators. Some of them were mothers of the children that came later to Sweden. 

Sister Luba that found the Dutch children outside the Kinderheim barrack, took full responsibility for the entire group. Due to Esther Werkendam age, she was tasked with supervising the small children there. She became known as 'Little Mother'.

As I mentioned above, not all the children with Dutch citizenship returned to Holland with the "Dimond group". Kallus Emma and her brother Rudolph, age 8 and 10 went to Sweden with the rest of the Kinderheim group. They were at the end of July 1945 transported to Sweden as part of UNRRA mission White Boats.

The history of family Kallus is characteristic for many Jewish families in Holland. In 1942 the whole family Kallus was arrested in The Haag and deported to the Westerbork transit camp. Father Jacob was sent to Buchenwald concentration camp while the rest of Kallus family were sent to the Herzogenbusch (Vught) concentration camp but after few weeks there they were sent back to Westerbork. Later, Kallus mother - Julie, with two sons Otto and Rudolf and daughter Emma were deported to Ravensbrück concentration camp on February 7, 1944. First they stayed all four together, but later Otto Kallus, age of twelve, was transferred from the Women's camp to the children barrack in Men's camp in Ravensbrück in October 1944. Probably in the beginning of 1945 mother Julie, together with Emma and Rudolf were transferred to Bergen-Belsen. Otto, the third child, was on March 3, 1945, transferred from Ravensbrück to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp where he had to work for the Heinkel Flugzeugwerke - airplane industry. The clearance of Sachsenhausen concentration camp started on 20 April 1945, as the front approached, both from east and west. More than 33 000 inmates, among them women and children, were forced to march on foot from Sachsenhausen towards the north-west. For most of them, the march ended with their liberation by Soviet or American forces in May 1945. Otto Kallus that was driven on a death march with others was liberated in the Schwerin area. Julie with Emma and Rudolf were liberated in Bergen-Belsen on April 15, 1945. Their parents perished in camps.  Father Jacob Kallus in Buchenwald in December 1944 and mother Julie two days after the liberation of Bergen-Belsen. 

Emma and Rudolf Kallus returned from Sweden (1946) to the Netherlands and reunited there with brother Otto. Thereafter, in 1949 all the siblings traveled to Israel, where they were adopted and grew up in the house of Leo and Lenni Lewin, Auschwitz survivors in Beth Aliya. 

Dutch Jews registrations cards. Here of two youngest siblings in Kallus family, Rudolf and Emma.  The date of deportation from Westerbork transit camp to concentration camp Ravensbrück 5. 2. 1944, (February 5, 1944), is underlined with in red pencil. The cards to start with were issued by Judenrat, here in The Haag, were used by Germans and after the war ended up with the Dutch Red Cross and were used to locate missing persons. There is a post-war notation that Kallus left for Sweden. 

DP-2 cards of Emma and Rudolf Kallus that arrived to Sweden with UNRRAs White Boats mission. After recovery in Sweden, they later returned to the Netherlands and reunited there with brother Otto. Thereafter, all three siblings traveled to Israel, where they grew up in the house of Auschwitz survivors in Beth Aliya.  The DP-2 card of Kallus Rudolf, just 4 years old when WWII started carries the entire Kallus family history. At nr. 9 we can read that Rudolf mother Julie died on April 20, 1945, 44 years old. It means she died just 5 days after the liberation of Bergen-Belsen. Last three rows on the card, at Remarks, it is stated that family was deported from Der Haag on November 10, 1942 to Westerbork transit camp. From Westerbork father was sent to Buchenwald and brother Otto to Ravensbrück. Sister Emma 8 year old in 1945 is marked on the Rudolfs card as accompanying person.

Entry card to Sweden

Three documents concerning Dutch families Kallus and Hirsch. Top left: The German list of deportation from Westerbork transit camp to concentration camp Ravensbrück. Kallus and Hirsch families are listed. On the right: Dutch Jews registration card of Olga Hirsch issued by Judenrat in The Haag, later used by Germans and after the war ended up by the Dutch Red Cross to locate missing persons. Therefore, there is a post-war notation that Olga Hirsch left for Sweden. On the bottom left: DP-2 card of Olga Hirsch issued by UNRRA in Lübeck just one day before she and the family members listed on the bottom of the card were transported to Sweden in the mission White Boats. Kallus Jakob that was separated earlier from the rest of the family and sent to Buchenwald concentration camp is not on the list. Olga Hirsch´s father Jozef "died" in the Buchenwald concentration camp. 


Entry card to Sweden

Olga Hirsch´s father Jozef Hirsch "died" in the Buchenwald concentration camp. 

Information about the death of Kallus Jakob, the father of Emma, Rudolf and Otto Kallus was written on their fathers registration card från concentration camp Buchenwald.

Information about the death of the father of Emma, Rudolf and Otto Kallus was written on their fathers  registration card från concentration camp Buchenwald..

Food and water was very limited and the conditions of the barracks were poor. Hetty relied on other children who were older for support and good spirits amongst the growing number of children. Sister Luba had other ladies to help her protect the children; however, many died. Their bodies were piled up on a mound right outside the Children's house.

In the beginning of 1945 the camp experienced a typhus epidemic. Numerous children fell sick, but survived as they had more food and better accommodation in Bergen-Belsen.

Lists of boys that arrived with the transport of men that arrived to concentration camp Buchenwald on December 2, 1944 (left) and the list of boys that were thereafter sent on January 5, 1945 from Buchenwald to concentration camp Bergen-Belsen. Both lists include 21 persons that are listed according to the age and after their prisoner number that was given at the registration in KL Buchenwald. On the list on the right the prisoner numbers are followed by the surnames. It is most likely that the boys arrived to Bergen-Belsen and the Kinderheim on the same day as the distance between the camps was about 280 km. It is know that this transport was by ordinary train and the boys were escorted by German soldiers.

Arrival of the boys from Piotrków Trybunalski - January 1945

Boys that arrived to Kinderheim and were originally from Piotrków Trybunalski were earlier, on December 2, 1944 sent together with their fathers or other male relatives sent in cattle wagons from the Piotrków to Buchenwald. Later, in Buchenwald after approximately one month, they were separated from their relatives and sent to Bergen-Belsen. Lists of boys that arrived with the transport of men that arrived to concentration camp Buchenwald on December 2, 1944 shows that the youngest boy was two and halt year old (Henechowicz Jidele). The list of  21 boys that were thereafter sent on January 5, 1945 from Buchenwald to concentration camp Bergen-Belsen include 21 persons that are listed according to the age and after their prisoner number that was given at the registration in KL Buchenwald. On the list on the right the prisoner numbers are followed by the surnames. Not he same boys It is most likely that the boys arrived to Bergen-Belsen and the Kinderheim on the same day as the distance between the camps was about 280 km. It is know that this transport was by ordinary train and the boys were escorted by German soldiers.

Arrival of the girls and woman from Piotrków Trybunalski - February 1945

It is exactly known when boys from Piotrków Trybunalski arrived to Kinderheim. There is no precise date of the arrival of the woman with children that were previously deported from Ravensbrück concentration camp.  According to testimonies it might be question of "few weeks" so it is likely that this group arrived at the end of in late January or beginning of February 1945. 

Mala Helfgot remembered; After about two and a half months there (in Ravensbrück), we were again put into cattle trucks to travel to another concentration camp, Bergen-Belsen, where we found total chaos. There was terrible over crowding, sanitation in the form of open pits and hardly any food. People walked around like zombies and looked like skeletons; there were piles of corpses and dead bodies lying around everywhere. Typhus was rife and there was an air of utter hopelessness. The degradation, humiliation and despair was clearly visible on people’s faces. You could be speaking to someone and she would literally drop dead in front of you. Hania (Helfgot Hanna, cousin of Mala) and I managed to search out a children’s barrack which was run by Sister Luba and a team of Jewish ‘nurses’, themselves inmates, who were very kind and devoted. I know that they used to beg, steal and do everything in their power to obtain a little extra food for the children. They also gave us loving care. The barack was situated opposite a large hut with a pile of corpses. 

So it is likely that after deportation from Piotrków on December 2, 1944 and after about 10 weeks in Ravensbrück the women and children were further transported in cattle trucks to Bergen-Belsen. According to numerous testimonies, the first night, in February they spend in a tents. It is likely that the same type of tests were later use for storage of the dead inmates.

Arrival of the last deported German Jews from Berlin - January 1945

Among the persons in the Kinderheim barack in Bergen-Belsen were several children, German Jews. Among them mother and the son that were deported from Berlin.

Kinderheim and Dropp-in

It is likely that it was well known, at least within the Woman camp, that there is a single barack called Kinderheim there.

According to one of the child survivors, Helfgott Mala, she and her cousin Helfgott Mala more och less knock the door there and were immediately admitted .

History of Bergen-Belsen camp

I was established and run for many years as a prisoner of war camp POWs camp called for Stalag short for Stammlager meaning main camp. It was administrated by German army Wehrmacht. In Stalag in the Bergen-Belsen area the very first POWs were Belgian and French. They were housed in the huts of former construction workers' that build a large military complex , a special training area for armoured vehicle training.

The workers who constructed the original buildings were housed. This Stalag was significantly expanded from June 1941, once Germany prepared to invade the Soviet Union, and was intended to hold up to 20,000 Soviet POWs. Following the suppression of the Warsaw Uprising in October 1944, around 1,000 members of the Polish Home Army (Armia Krakow short AK) were imprisoned in a separate section of the POW camp. There were many female members of the Polish Home Army
Originally

In April 1943, a part of the Bergen-Belsen camp was taken over by the SS and became part of the concentration camp system, run by the SS. What is of special interest is the fact that in SS hands Bergen-Belsen was designated first to be a Zivilinterniertenlager ("civilian internment camp"). However, in June 1943 it was redesignated and renamed to be Aufenthaltslager ("holding camp"). This because as Aufenthaltslager it must be open to inspection by international committees according to Geneva Conventions. As  Aufenthaltslager - "holding camp" it was ment to be an "exchange camp" for Jews who were intended to be exchanged for German civilians interned in other countries, or for hard currency. The same idea of ing esienstadt. The SS divided this camp into subsections for individual groups (the "Hungarian camp", the "special camp" for Polish Jews, the "neutrals camp" for citizens of neutral countries and the "Star camp" for Dutch Jews). Between the summer of 1943 and December 1944 at least 14,600 Jews, including 2,750 children and minors were transported to the Bergen-Belsen "holding" or exchange camp. The prisoners of this part of the camp were treated less harshly than some other classes of Bergen-Belsen prisoner until fairly late in the war, due to their perceived potential exchange value. Around 2,560 Jewish prisoners were actually released. read exchanged from Bergen-Belsen and allowed to leave Germany.

In March 1944, part of the camp was redesignated as an Erholungslager ("recovery camp") where prisoners too sick to work were brought from other concentration camps. Many of them died in Belsen of disease, starvation, exhaustion and lack of medical attention and never returned to the camps of origin .

In August 1944, a new section was created and this became the so-called "Women's camp", later known as Horror camp. By November 1944 this camp received around 9,000 women and young girls. Most of those who were able to work stayed only for a short while and were then sent on to other concentration camps or slave-labour camps. The first women interned there were Poles, arrested after the failed Warsaw Uprising. Others were Jewish women from Poland or Hungary, transferred from Auschwitz.

In 1943, parts of POWs camp became a concentration camp. Initially this thought to be only an "exchange camp", where Jewish hostages were held with the intention of exchanging them for German prisoners or money. The camp was later expanded to accommodate Jews from other concentration camps.

Most of the children and mothers with children originating from Poland and from Piotrków Trybunalski Ghetto came indirectly to Bergen-Belsen. Their first concentration camp was in most cases Ravensbrück. Male children from the same city were first sent to Buchenwald and after separation from their fathers they were sent to Bergen-Belsen. In most cases children left Piotrków on December, 2 1944.

For the Dutch children the first camp was usually Westerbork and thereafter Ravensbrück and Bergen-Belsen.

From the European countries, south of Poland Auschwitz was usually their first camp after the deportations from the ghettos in the home cities.

diamond trade and some 30 children from Poland and Slovakia. Upon

liberation, the Dutch children were repatriated and not many others

remained.

Kinderbaracke with 52 Dutch children of Jewish families from the

diamond trade and some 30 children from Poland and Slovakia. Upon

liberation, the Dutch children were repatriated and not many others

remained.

DP-2 card of one of two Klein brothers that were liberated in Bergen-Belsen and came with Kinderheim children by UNRRA mission White Boats to Sweden. Klein Otto and Albert were born in Yugoslavia according to DP-2 card. Reading the information about their parents one can easily find out that they were previously inmates of Auschwitz where their father was murdered, described by French register: reste a Auschwitz. Rester is the French verb that means "to stay" or "to remain". In the same way the mother of the boys Elzbieta Klein reste a Bergen-Belsen. L: 7898 was Ottos number of his Swedish entry card, while Albert had L: 7899. 

I have not seen any list of children from the Kinderheim before the liberation. It is likely that at this very end of existence of the Bergen-Belsen camp the staff of Kinderheim was just reporting number of children in Kinderheim. Probably there was another list of the women with children that were not getting the same portions of food as Kinderheim children. 

It is possible that the first list of Kinderheim children was the one from the children ward after the liberation. Here, however, there was no distinction made if the children survived in the Kinderheim barrack or at other locations in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. On some of the DP-2 cards issued in July 1945 at UNRRA registration office in Lübeck there is a hand written notice in the right top corner: Kinderheim or Bergen or both. This notation seems to be related to register itself as numerous children do not have this type of writing.

It is possible that the first list of Kinderheim children was the one from the children ward after the liberation. Here, however, there was no distinction made if the children survived in the Kinderheim barrack or at other locations in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. On some DP-2 cards issued in July 1945 at UNRRA registration office in Lübeck there is a hand written notice in the right top corner: Kinderheim or Bergen or both kite on Lili Kadar DP-2 card.

How the Barrack 211 was divided inside?

Here is a quote about the interior and direct surroundings of the 'Kinderheim',  barrack number 211. The quote is from Faith at the Brink, the memoir by Osher (=Oscar) M. Lehmann, born in 1933 and one of the Diamond children.

"Our barrack was subdivided into various sections. We children had three large rooms - one for eating, one for sleeping and one room where we whiled away our time. The women in charge had their own smaller room. My bed was a double decker bed, of which I occupied the upper unit and my cousin Erika slept in the lower bed.
An interior barrack partition next to my bed was a thin wall enclosing an area known as the maternity ward. There, expectant mothers would come when they went into labor. To the best of my knowledge, none of their babies survived. In fact, we would occasionally see a dead newborn baby at the bottom of the deep pit behind the maternity ward. [...]
In front of our barrack was a hard unpaved road perhaps nine feet wide. This road led to another barrack further down known as the 'hospital'. [...]
Once the sick died, their bodies were temporarily placed into a small brick house in front of our barrack."
Faith at the Brink, Brooklyn (NY): Lehmann Books, 1996), p. 151.

In June 1943 Lehmann's family was deported to Westerbork transit camp. However, they were soon returned to Amsterdam, where Ohers father, Markus was sent to work for the Nazis in the diamond business. In November 1943 they were sent to Westerbork again, together with other members of the "Diamond group". Later from Westerbork. in May 1944, they were sent together with their families to the "Diamond compound", barrack 17 in Bergen-Belsen. Nazi had planned to establish a diamond industry close to the Bergen-Belsen. However, their plans failed, due to the refusal of the members of the group to cooperate a.o. to tell the war to get raw diamonds. Lehmann's parents were thereafter deported to other camps, while Osher and his siblings were sent to the Women's camp and Kinderheim barrack there. All of them survived. After the war Lehmann returned to Holland, then moved to England and finally to New York. Osher Lehmanns parents perished in Holocaust. Above "pink card" issued by Dutch Judenrat. The card was later used by Germans. The dates of departure to Westerbork and thereafter to Bergen-Belsen as well place and date of death of Markus Lehmann are clearly indicated.

Piotrkowers

As I wrote earlier, my interest was, to start with focused on Piotrkower children. Boys and girls that were sent on December 4, 1944 out of Piotrków to Buchenwald and Ravensbrück and later, some of them landed in Kinderheim in Bergen-Belsen. However, not all of the children and youngsters from Piotrkow landed in Bergen-Belsen and were liberated there. Several liberated in Buchenwald were sent to France

and also many of those who were liberated  Theresienstadt were flown to England. During this British action 732 youngsters arrived in England, among whom were 41 from Piotrkow; 37 boys and 4 girls. The large majority of youngsters had lost their parents – only four from the Piotrkow group were left with a surviving parent. Quite a large number had no family or relatives anywhere in the world; there had been a complete and utter loss of family.

Actually, I should write whom I regarded as "the Piotrkower". My definition is rather broad, not just purely Piotrkower born. For me the Piotrkowers are alos the Jews from the outside of Piotrków. Jews from Piotrków surroundings taken by Nazis from their homes and transferred to the Piotrków ghetto by force. We know that up to 28 000 Jews were squeezed into a part of Piotrków, where previously, prior WWII only 6 000 people lived. The list of the Jews were ass

Dziecięcy Raj - 100-lecie powstania kolonii Korczaka Różyczka - 100 years of Różyczka summer camp

Adam Matysiak przesłał niedawno zdjęcia z Marysina Wawerskiego z wystawy z okazji 100-lecia powstania kolonii Różyczka. 10.X.2021. To powiększenie zdjęcia z ostatnich kolonii z roku 1940.

Adam Matysiak przesłał niedawno zdjęcia z Marysina Wawerskiego z wystawy z okazji 100-lecia powstania kolonii Różyczka. 10.X.2021. To powiększenie zdjęcia z ostatnich kolonii z roku 1940.

To nie przypadek że w Marysinie Wawerskim są ulice Starego Doktora i Króla Maciusia I.

W roku 1921 Janusz Korczak założył we wsi Czaplowizna kolonie Domu Sierot "Różyczka". Czaplowizna znajdowała się po północnej stronie dzisiejszej ul. Korkowej. Teraz stoją tam bloki, boisko i ośrodek sportowy Syrenka. W Różyczce dzieci z Domu Sierot jak i z innych sierocinców co roku spędzały wiosnę i lato.

Nazwa "Różyczka" wzięła się od imienia zmarłej córki Maksymiliana Cohena i jego żony, którzy chcieli poprzez tą darowiznę uczcić jej pamięć.

Na początku okupacji kolonii pomagała gmina Wawer – dostarczała m.in. żywność i opał. W październiku 1940 r. mieszkańcy Różyczki musieli przenieść się do warszawskiego getta na ulicę Chłodną 33.

Wielkie dzięki dla organizatorów wystawy.

Vid Andra Världskrigets slut både Vita bussar och Vita Båtar fungerade som flyktväg.

Benjamin Sieradzki beskriver både tyska och ukrainska vakter på fartyget han anlände till Malmö den 25 juli 1945. Sieradzki var 12 när kriget startade och var fånge i Lodz Getto, Auschwitz och i Ahlem där han befriades den 10 april 1945 av de amerikanska trupperna.

Nazister ombord och på de svenska beredskapssjukhusen har rapporterats ett antal gånger. Bl.a. av de överlevande som hittade en tysk lägervakt och ville slå ihjäl henne. På samma sätt rapporterades det flera gånger om "bråk" på fartygen. Bråk som uppstod då de befriade hittade sina fd plågare bland resenärer.

Benjamin Sieradzki beskriver både tyska och ukrainska vakter på fartyget han anlände till Malmö den 25 juli 1945. Sieradzki var 12 när kriget startade och var fånge i Lodz Getto, Auschwitz och i Ahlem där han befriades den 10 april 1945 av de amerikanska trupperna. Sieradzki beskriver inte enstaka personer men mängder och att bland de fanns riktiga överlevande.

Lyssna https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn507714

Om Sieradzkis transport från Bergen-Belsen sjukhuset till Swedish Transit Hospital i Lübeck och därefter till Malmö och Tennisstadion där finns på bandet vid 1:13:00. "Horrible nazis" paraderade bland oss...

Vad hände därefter med alla nazister som kom till Sverige?

American Joint Distribution Committee (AJDC) in the Bergen-Belsen DP camp - Special card for tracing missing persons after WWII.

Ruta and Tusia (Ellen) Rubinlicht.

Three cards of Rubinlicht family that survived the Holocaust and were brought from Bergen-Belsen to Sweden by UNRRA White Boat Mission. 

Three cards of the Rubinlicht family that survived the Holocaust and were brought from Bergen-Belsen to Sweden by the UNRRA White Boat Mission. At the top of the Card, the source of a particular piece of information about a person’s location can be – but is not always – noted in the upper left of the card. This might be precise information about a specific list, as in this case Sweden and list number 5. At the bottom line, there is information that all three persons arrived after June 26, 1945. June 26, 1945, was the official date when the White Boat mission started and at that time all five White Boats were in the port of Lübeck ready to take former inmates of Bergen-Belsen to Sweden. That was probably the way to define this group as there were several other groups of former inmates that arrive in Denmark and later to Sweden by trains and by Red Cross expedition White buses.

The employees of the Location Service of the American Joint Distribution Committee (AJDC) in the Bergen-Belsen DP camp created a special card for tracing missing persons. They used this card to note information they had gathered on Holocaust survivors. The AJDC was an aid organization founded in the USA in 1914. After the end of World War II, it supported official organizations such as UNRRA.

The card helped them process tracing inquiries more quickly. Some of the information on the cards is very precise, but in other cases only rough information was available. The cards all look very similar; there are just small differences in the typeface used. Most of the cards were created during 1947-1948. Most probably the DP-2 cards issued by UNNRA were used by AJDC as the source.

DP-2 cards of three persons of Rubinlicht's family that survived the Holocaust and were brought from Bergen-Belsen to Sweden by the UNRRA White Boat Mission. In the card of Anna Rubinlicht, we can follow the entire story of the family. Sisters that were sent to the death camp Treblinka in 1942, Annas husband's and her and her two daughters that were sent from Piotrków Ghetto to Ravnsbrück concentration camp in late 1944 and thereafter transported to Bergen-Belsen.

Most of the AJDC cards were created during 1947-1948. Most probably the DP-2 cards issued by UNNRA were used as the source. Here we have also information that Rubinlicht wanted to go to Eretz Israel and Tel-Aviv.

Most of the cards were created during 1947-1948. Most probably the DP-2 cards issued by UNNRA were used as the source. Here on the right is the ship list of the White Boat, S/S Kastelholm that brought Rubinlichts to Malmö. Later they left for the USA.

Rubinlicht parents worked, forced labor, at Huta Hortensja, one of two the Piotrków glass factories. Father, Pinkus Rubinlicht, like many others, was paying off whom he could to keep his family together. Judenrat members and probably Germans as well. During the Great Action in Piotrków Ghetto in October 1942 the Rubinlicht parents were relatively safe as workers of the glass factory, however, the children, Tusia and Ruta, were sent outside of the ghetto. During the Action in October 1942, the rest of their extended family in Piotrków was sent to their death in the Treblinka extermination camp.
After the Action in October 1942 Jews in Piotrków lived in a very limited area called Small Ghetto. However, at the end of July 1943, the Small ghetto was liquidated and Piotrków was declared “free of Jews” with information about it at the railway station. Although Piotrków was declared “free of Jews”, 1,720 Jews could stay in factories: 1 000 at the Bugaj wood factory, and the rest at two glass factories. 500 other Jews from the Small Ghetto were deported to labor camps in Blizyn, Pionki, and Starachowice.

Two years later, during, November and December 1944, the final deportations of Jews from glass factories Kara and Hortensja and wood factory Bugaj, were planned. On November 24, 1944, the first of the final transportation came. Pinkus Rubinlicht got his name on the list to go to Mauthausen in German-annexed Austria. However, he was first registered in Buchenwald on December 24, 1944. Later he was transferred to Mittelblau Dora. Mittelbau-Dora was located near Nordhausen in Thuringia, Germany. To start with it was established in the late summer of 1943 as a subcamp of Buchenwald concentration camp, supplying slave labor and later including evacuated survivors of eastern extermination camps. It is possible that  Pinkus Rubinlicht that was registered as a watchmaker was involved in the manufacturing of the V-2 rocket. He perished in the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp on March 27, 1945. The cause of his death was written in German Grippe. That means the flu. However, we have to remember that the camp records of the registered inmates often use to state false causes of death. It is known that the official cause of death of the inmates that were shot was registered in many cases as cardiac arrest. Other causes often used were bilateral pneumonia and septic pharyngitis.

The wrong year of birth should be 1935. Registration card from Sundsgården, the place where most of the children and mothers from "Kinderheim" came to after arrival to Sweden. Arrival day July 26, 1945.

Rubinlicht family that survived the Holocaust and were brought from Bergen-Belsen to Sweden by UNRRA White Boat Mission. Here Rubinlicht Anna, first on the right with daughters Ruta (born 1935) and Tusia (born 1939), in the middle. The child on the left is Anetka Niechcicka with her mother. Anetka was born in September 1942 in Piotrków Trybunalski Ghetto. The photo taken during the first Winther in Sweden (1945-1946). Probably at Visingsö.

Pinkus Rubinlicht got his name on the list to go to Mauthausen in German-annexed Austria. He perished there in March 27, 1945, in the concentration camp. The cause of his death was written in German Grippe. That means the flu. However, the camp records of the registered inmates use to state false causes of death. It is known that the official cause of death of the inmates that were shot was in many cases cardiac arrest. Other causes often used were bilateral pneumonia and septic pharyngitis.

When larger groups of prisoners were put to death at the same time, also the dates of death were also falsified and were distributed over a period of 2 or 3 weeks, a dozen or so per day. The death certificates issued by concentration camps doctors for specific registered prisoners can serve as an example of the deliberate falsification of camp records and should be a warning to young researchers, who should use all imaginable caution in drawing conclusions from such a record.

Pinkus Rubinlicht's wife and his daughters were on the list of women and children to be sent during the first week of December 1944 to Ravensbrück in northeast Germany. On the same day when women were transported to Ravensbrück the men with boys were sent to Buchenwald concentration camp.
By the beginning of 1945, the Nazis were losing the War, and the both Red Army from the East and the 

Allied forces from the west were quickly moving towards Berlin. Therefore, the inmates of several camps including Auschwitz in the East and Ravensbrück in the West were moved to Bergen-Belsen. Deportations were performed by cattle train transports and by Death marches. Rubinlichts, mother Anna, and her two daughters were in January 1945 sent from Ravensbrück to Bergen-Belsen. They were liberated there on April 15th by the British army. Later they were moved to the Bergen-Belsen hospital and thereafter in late July 1945, they were moved to Malmö, Sweden by the UNRRAs White Boat mission. Their health was bad as described in Swedish medical cards. After recovery in Sweden, the Rubinlichts decided in early 1946 to go to Belgium (instead of Israel), where they were reunited with Uncle Berek (Pinkus brother), who had survived the War by the protection of a Catholic priest. In Belgium, they were waiting for an entry visa to the USA. First in 1951 that the Rubinlichts were able to immigrate to Chicago, sponsored by another uncle who had come to the United States many years earlier.

Piotrków Trybunalski was liberated by the Red Army on January 16, 1945.

Chase, grandchild of the Holocaust survivor, Rubinlich wrote to me:

Oh my God! You really have information on her during that point. Please share with me what you know. I should tell my grandmother this when I have a chance. All I know is that Anna and her two daughters spent quite some time in Sweden after being liberated from Bergen Belsen. My grandmother (Ruta-Rita) fondly remembers the kindness the Swedish showed to her, her mom (Anna), and her sister (Tusia-Ellen). 
Chase

Hi Chase,

To start with, the fate of Your grand-grandmother and her daughters was "typical" for them who survived the Actions in 1942 in Piotrków Trybunalski.  "Typical" for those who had not survived, was the deportation to Treblinka and death by suffocation in the gas chamber (that was also the fate of my grandparents Rozental from Warszawa).

Many of the 1942 survivors were working at three different factories in Piotrków - Bugaj, Kara, and Hortensja.  After the end of 1943 and the Piotrków (Petrikau) ghetto was liquidated, the entire families of Jewish workers in these factories lived within the factory area, also small children.

During the deportations at the end of 1944 also entire factories were emptied and Jews were sent to different camps. December 4th deportations were very special: male workers with sons were sent to Buchenwald while females with daughters were sent to Ravensbrück.

They traveled in cattle cars without food or water. Upon arrival in Ravensbrück and had to strip before their heads were shaved. Thereafter there were given the typical concentration camp clothing and clogs. Now we were really stripped of our personalities as well; we could not recognize one another. After about two and a half months in Ravensbrück, they were again put into cattle trucks and sent to Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. That must be at the end of February 1945. The situation there was terrible due to overcrowding, sanitation, and food shortage. In Bergen-Belsen, however, existed Kinderheim - children’s barrack number 211. It was run by Luba Tryszynska and a team of Jewish ‘nurses’ that came from Auschwitz. All of them were also inmates. Inmates who tried to do everything in their power to obtain a little extra food for the children. In the same barrack, across the hall there, lived women with children. I think that your grand-grandmother Anna and her two daughters also lived there.

After the liberation, the entire barrack 211 was after approximately 3 weeks moved to the Children's ward at Bergen-Belsen Hospital.

Thereafter they moved on July 24th by ambulance train to the Swedish Transit hospital in Lübeck and from there to Sweden by the UNRRA mission's White Boats.

They arrived in Malmö in Sweden by the very last White Boat - S/S Kastelholm. I have their names on the ship list. In Sweden, they were placed at different hospitals. I will send You, more info later. However, You will find a lot of information about Piotrków and Kinderheim on my blog. Just use the search option.

Best,

Roman Wassermann Wroblewski

Chairman

Swedish Holocaust Memorial Association - SHMA.