Z dziejów Zagłady w Kraju Warty. Losy ludności żydowskiej w Sieradzu 1939–1942

In 1938, the total of 10,747 inhabitants of Sieradz included 2,555 Jews, namely 1,170 men and 1,385 women. After 1 September 1939, like the Polish population, vast majority of them left the town due to the announced defence of the line of the Warta River. Some of them did not return to their homes after that. Later on, the number of Jews in Sieradz changed also due to deportations to the General Government and to labour camps in the area of the Warta Country, as well as due to the influx of Jews from the surrounding towns. From the beginning of the occupation, Jews from Sieradz experienced the Nazi terror, including executions. The first ones were shot already on 15 September 1939. At the beginning of 1940, a ghetto was created in Sieradz. Although it was not a closed ghetto, it did contribute to a serious deterioration of the situation of the Jewish population. Numerous penalties imposed by the Schupo officers prove that in order to survive in the ghetto, one had to manage to get additional food outside its boundaries. The Judenrat established in Sieradz, led by Kalman Rosenblu, had limited possibilities of improving the situation of local Jews. It even failed to create joint craft workshops to solve the problem of excess of manpower. Support from the Polish population was not significant, as it did not have an organised nature. From 24 August 1942, liquidation of the ghetto in Sieradz commenced. All the Jews were placed in a local post-Dominican monastery, and from there they were transported for extermination. On the first day, 184 people were transported to the ghetto in Łódź. Until Friday, 28 August, about 1,400 Jews from Sieradz were deported to the extermination camp in Chełmno on the Ner River.