Germans resume deportations from Warsaw to Treblinka
On this day the deportation of Jews from the Warsaw ghetto to the concentration camp at Treblinka is resumedbut not without much bloodshed and resistance along the way.On July 18 1942 Heinrich Himmler promoted Auschwitz camp commandant Rudolf Hess to SS major.He also ordered that the Warsaw ghetto the Jewish quarter constructed by the Nazis upon the occupation of Poland and enclosed first by barbed wire and then by brick walls be depopulateda total cleansing as he described it.The inhabitants were to be transported to what became a second extermination camp constructed at the railway village of Treblinka 62 miles northeast of Warsaw.Within the first seven weeks of Himmlers order more than 250000 Jews were taken to Treblinka by rail and gassed to death marking the largest single act of destruction of any population group Jewish or non-Jewish civilian or military in the war.
Upon arrival at T.II as this second camp at Treblinka was called prisoners were separated by sex stripped and marched into what were described as bathhouses but were in fact gas chambers.T.
IIs first commandant was Dr.Irmfried Eberl age 32 the man who had headed up the euthanasia program of 1940 and had much experience with the gassing of victims especially children.He was assisted in his duties by several hundred Ukrainian and about 1500 Jewish prisoners who removed gold teeth from victims before hauling the bodies to mass graves.In January 1943 after a four-month hiatus the deportations started up again.
A German SS unit entered the ghetto and began rounding up its denizensbut they did not go without a fight.Six hundred Jews were killed in the streets as they struggled with the Germans.Rebels with smuggled firearms opened fire on the SS troops.
The Germans returned firemachine-gun fire against the Jews pistol shots.Nine Jewish rebels fellas did several Germans.The fighting continued for days with the Jews refusing to surrender and even taking arms from their Germans persecutors in surprise attacks.Amazingly the Germans withdrew from the ghetto in the face of the unexpected resistance.
They likely did not realize how few armed resisters there were but the fact that resistance was given at all intimidated them.But there was no happy ending.Before this new incursion into the ghetto was over 6000 more Jews were transported to their likely deaths at Treblinka.
