In 1939, approximately 12,000 people lived in the town of Aleksandrów Kujawski (German: Alexandrowo); roughly 10 percent of them were Jews. October 1939 saw the town’s annexation by the Germans, and it became part of Landkreis Nessau (Nieszawa County), which was renamed Hermannsbad (Ciechocinek) in 1940.[1] According to Germans records, almost 4,000 Jews lived in the county.[2] By January 1940, most of the Jews had been expelled, some of them deported to the General Government (Generalgouvernement, the zone of Nazi-occupied central Poland not formally annexed to the Reich).[3] According to different sources, in June 1940 between 1,530 and 2,188 Jews were left in the county, only a few of them in Aleksandrów Kujawski.[4] By the summer of 1941, at least one group of young Jews had been deported to forced labor camps.[5]
Between April 22 and 23, 1942, the Nazis liquidated all of the ghettos and Jewish communities in Landkreis Hermannsbad, deporting a total of 1,277 Jews to Chełmno, sixty-three of whom came from Aleksandrów Kujawski. The deportations were carried out with the assistance of the gendarmerie policemen in the county and by the Schupo policemen (Schutzpolizei, uniformed regular police force). In most cases, the Jews were gathered in a local place such as a church and were subsequently deported by trucks of the SS Sonderkommando Kulmhof (Chełmno),[6] which confirms that they were deported to Chełmno.
On March 11, 1942, a woman name Sala Szklarek (née Szymanowicz, b. 1905)[7] from Aleksandrów Kujawski sent a typed letter in Polish to an individual in Warsaw. The letter was preserved by the Warsaw ghetto underground archival group "Oneg Shabbat," headed by Dr. Emanuel Ringelblum. This letter appears to be the last sign of life from her before she was deported to Chełmno.[8]...