The word and notices went out in the ghetto: All persons who were able to walk or be transported were to show up at 3pm that afternoon at the Umschlagplatz or 'loading platform' for deportation and relocation to Eastern Poland. Very little other information was given. There was one condition however: anyone who refused the order for deportation would be shot on site.
You were allowed to take one suitcase, a few valuables and up to 5 pounds of whatever you could carry. All one knew was that they would end up somewhere else for 'resettlement'. There were rumors that the trains would take them to a workcamp or deportation center to wait out the war. Other more sinister rumors, mostly from youthful zionists, were alarming, and told of 'death camps' where they were killing Jews. These more radical rumors were often dismissed because they were just too horrible to be true: no one could believe that camps like that existed: and so they compliantly showed up for deportation.
It was not as if there were really a choice to show up on the umschlägplatz, for there were penalties ranging up to death if one did not. In the Warsaw Ghetto, the deportation orders clearly stated that:
5) Penalties:a)Every Jew not belonging to the categories enumerated in paragraph 2 .
points a) and c) and not entitled to belong to them who leave s the Jewish quarter at the beginning of the deportation will be shot. b)Every Jew who acts as as to evade or impede the execution of the orders concerning deportat on will be shot.
c) Every Jew who abets acts which may lead to the evasion or impeding of the execution of the deportation, will be shot.
d) Every Jew who is seen in Warsaw after the conclusion of the deportation order, and who does not belong to the categories enumerated in paragraph 2, points a) to h) will be shot.
<© 2004 Elizabeth Kirkley Best PhD; Shoah Education Project-Web