Transport from Kalisz, Kalisz, Lodz, Poland to Lublin, Lublin, Lublin, Poland on 02/12/1939

The Germans occupied Kalisz (Kalisch), the capital city of the Kalisz region, which had a Jewish population of approximately 25,000 prior to the war, in September 1939. At the end of November that year, the German police and Selbstschutz (a paramilitary Nazi group of ethnic Germans subordinated to the local SS and police) entered Jewish homes and ordered the occupants to leave the place, taking their personal belongings and some money with them. According to the order of Reichsführer SS Heinrich Himmler on the expulsion of Jews and Poles from the Warthegau, Jewish deportees were allowed to take food, one suitcase with necessities, and cash of up to fifty złotys. The transport to Lublin left Kalisz on December 2, and was the first of two transports to depart that day (the other transport went to Sandomierz (Sandomir)). George Starkman, who was on this transport, recalled in his post-war testimony that when the Germans entered their home, they did not tell them to pack a suitcase, but just ordered them to leave. The family only managed to put some personal belongings into a pillowcase....