Transport IX from Caserne Dossin (Malines-Mechelen), Camp, Belgium to Auschwitz Birkenau, Extermination Camp, Poland on 12/09/1942

Since the opening of Mechelen camp call-up letters had been distributed among non-Belgian Jews residing in Belgium for labour service in Germany. Jews with Belgian citizenship, as well as Jews in mixed marriages were still exempt from deportation. In the letters, which were distributed by the AJB, each person was ordered to report at the Dossin casern and had to bring provisions for 14 days, clothing and important documents such as identity papers and ration coupons. Thus far the German authorities were not satisfied with the number of people who had reported at Mechelen in response to the call-up letters. As a result, the Sipo and the FG (Feldgendermerie, German military police units) and the Flemish SS carried out individual arrests. On August 28, 1942 Eichmann convened a meeting in the RSHA in Berlin with Heinz Roethke, who served as an expert on Jewish Affairs (Judenberater) in France. In a report of this meeting issued by Horst Ahnert, Roethke’s assistant, it was announced that the quota of the Jews to be deported would be raised to 20,000 before the end of 1942. Because Eichmann expected limited means of transport from November to January, he instructed the department of Jewish Affairs in Brussels to increase the transports. Starting from mid-September he could make daily a train available. In the same meeting it was decided that the foreign Jews in Belgium would all be deported by the end of June 1943....