Transport from Emden, Emden (Aurich), Hanover, Germany to Berlin, Berlin (Berlin), City of Berlin, Germany on 23/10/1941

In 1933, Emden, the largest city in the north German region of Ostfriesland (East Frisia), was home to some 581 Jews. By 1938, fifty of them had left the city, and another 130 had emigrated from Nazi Germany. After the pogrom of November 9-10, 1938 (Kristallnacht), and the deportation of Jewish men from Emden and neighbouring settlements to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp on November 11,^[1] more local Jews left Germany for other countries, such as the UK and Palestine. In November 1939, there were some 320 Jews remaining in Emden, and their rights and freedoms were steadily curtailed. In 1940, most of these Jews were relocated to bigger cities, such as Hamburg, Berlin, or Frankfurt am Main, where they were included in the subsequent deportations to occupied Poland (the General Government).^[2] In April 1940, Ostfriesland was declared judenfrei (free of Jews).^[3]

However, a number of Jews, who had been declared unfit for travel, still remained in the city, living in the institutions of the Jewish community. On October 18, 1941, the last Jews from the nearby towns of Aurich^[4] and Norden were assembled, together with the remaining Jews of Emden, at the Emden retirement home on Claas-Tholen Street. On October 23, the Gestapo deported 122 Jews from Emden to Berlin by train. The next day, the Jewish men and women were included in the second transport leaving the German capital for the Łódź (Litzmannstadt) Ghetto in Reichsgau Wartheland (Warthegau) in occupied Poland.^[5] The deportees arrived at the Radegast train station on October 25. They were marched into the ghetto, and subsequently absorbed into its population.^[6] The Chronicle of the Lodz Ghetto records the arrival of 122 Jews with Emden transport 10a on October 25, 1941.^[7] According to the Chronicle, the Jews from Emden were temporarily housed in Marysin, on Staszica Street.^[8] Most of the deportees from Emden were subsequently moved to 26 Gnieznienska (Gnesener) Street. Among them were the van der Waldes, a family of nine. Ella van der Walde (born June 1, 1863) would lose her life on March 1, 1942.^[9]

On October 25, 1941, the Wilhelmshaven Gestapo reported to the Reichssicherheitshauptamt (RSHA, Reich Security Main Office): "On October 23, 1941, 122 Jews were evacuated from the town of Emden. They will be detained in a larger town in the East. Thus, the Wilhelmshaven Gestapo district is now free of Jews, with the exception of twenty-three Jews in need of care, and those still living in mixed marriages."^[10]...