Transport IV from Caserne Dossin (Malines-Mechelen), Camp, Belgium to Auschwitz Birkenau, Extermination Camp, Poland on 18/08/1942

By August 15, three transports had left Mechelen for Auschwitz with a total of 2,997 Jews on board, thus indicating to the Sipo-SD that it would be impossible to achieve the quota of 20,000 Jews by the end of the year if the hitherto sluggish pace continued. The German authorities therefore took an approach that had already been successfully applied in the Netherlands and in France: mass arrests of Jews by means of large scale raids. The first such raid was conducted on the night of August 15 in Antwerp. Nearly 17,000 Jews lived in Greater Antwerp at that time. The reason for choosing this city instead of Brussels which had a much higher number of Jews was attributable to the compliance of the Flemish bureaucracy which had been tested by the introduction of the yellow badge. Whereas the Wallonian authorities in the capital had refused to distribute the Jewish star, the new mayor of Greater Antwerp, Leo Delwaide approved it. This was due to the influence of the Flemish collaboration party Vlaams Nationaal Verbond. The raid was ordered by the Sipo-SD over the phone in the morning hours of August 15 and implemented by the head of the Antwerp Department for Jewish Affairs, SS-Oberscharführer Erich Holm. 50 Belgian policemen and three officers were called to duty for 8:30 pm. They were instructed to close off certain streets. At 10 p.m. SS and FG forces then systematically combed the houses. The documented numbers of arrested Jews vary between 998 and 1,067. They were immediately brought to Mechelen, 25 km away. This ‘Judenaktion’ made it possible to assemble Transport IV in two days. The transport list that had been started on August 14 was finalized before the raid and was based on the Jewish registry provided by the AJB to the Sipo-SD. 704 deportees had been rounded up in the raid. A further 172 people had been randomly arrested at other locations....