Transport Ag from Theresienstadt, Ghetto, Czechoslovakia to Piaski, Ghetto, Poland on 01/04/1942

The transport orders were handed to the camp commander, Siegfried Seidl from the Central Office for Jewish Emigration (Zentralstelle für jüdische Auswanderung) in Prague, who passed them on to the Jewish leadership of the ghetto (Ältestenrat). On March 27, 1942, the Jewish Council announced in the Daily Order (Tagesbefehl) Nr. 86 that a further transport with 1,000 people would be dispatched to the East ("nach Osten") on April 1 or 2. Certain groups were eligible for exemption and could apply by March 28 at 6:00 p.m. These included family members who otherwise would be torn apart, people above 65 years of age, veterans of WWI, Jews married to non-Jews, or those with foreign citizenship. On March 29, the departure was finalized for April 1, the Jewish holiday of Passover. The transport, designated “Ag”, departed from Theresienstadt on April 1, 1942. At least 1,000 Theresienstadt inmates were on board – men, women and children. It was the first in a series of transports that left Theresienstadt in April for the Lublin District. The train's destination was the transit ghetto Piaski, southeast of Lublin. On the day of the transport, the Jews were marched or taken by truck to the Bohusovice (Bauschowitz) train station, some 3 km outside the ghetto where they were loaded onto the railway cars that were waiting. Five freight wagons carried the deportees' belongings....