Page 87 - Centrum Dialogu im. Marka Edelmana w Łodzi. "Fragmenty pamięci".

Wielka Szpera 5-12 września 1942 The Great Szpera, 5-12 September 1942

Łódź Ghetto / Litzmannstadt Ghetto
from February 1940 till September 1942

The Germans created the ghetto for the Jewish inhabitants of Łódź in February 1940. More than 160,000
people were initially concentrated in an area of 4.13 square kilometres. All Jews had to move from
other districts to the area of the old town and Bałuty. The Jewish quarter’s final closure and strict
isolation occurred on 30 April 1940. By then, Łódź had a new occupational name – Litzmannstadt.

At the end of 1941, the Germans brought to the ghetto nearly 20,000 Jews from Western Europe:
Austria, the Czech Republic, Luxembourg and Germany, and over 5,000 Roma and Sinti from
Burgenland. Jewish inhabitants from the surrounding towns and cities, including Zduńska Wola,
Sieradz, Ozorków, Łask and Pabianice, also ended up here. In total, more than 200,000 people passed
through the Łódź ghetto.

The Łódź ghetto was a compulsory labour camp from the very beginning. In exchange for food, Jewish
prisoners produced clothes, shoes, tools, and equipment needed by the Reich economy, especial-
ly the German army. But private orders were also carried out in the ghetto. The Germans needed
the ghetto, so it lasted until the summer of 1944. But living conditions were challenging. There was
a shortage of food and fuel, outbreaks of epidemics, and overcrowding; the mortality rate was very
high. During the five years of the war, more than 43,000 Jews died in the ghetto from hunger, cold
and exhaustion.

In 1942, following the decision on the so-called “Final Solution to the Jewish Question,” the Jews of Litz-
mannstadt were deported to the extermination camp at Chełmno (Kulmhof am Ner). Between Janu-
ary and mid-May 1942, the Germans deported more than 57,000 people there. Initially, it was unknown
where the transports from the ghetto went and what happened to the people who left the ghetto.
The stories of newcomers from towns and cities near Łódź about how they and their relatives were
treated were horrifying. It was known that only the healthy, strong, and fit for work were saved from
Pabianice, Zelów or Bełchatów. The sick, the weak and young children were deported in an unknown
direction, and no one heard about them. Gradually, it became apparent to the Jews that people were
not being transported to other camps but to their deaths. Therefore, emptying the hospitals of the
sick, which began on the morning of 1 September 1942, caused panic in the ghetto. And this was only
the prologue to the Great Szpera.

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