Transport 5 from Wien, Vienna, Austria to Opatow, Opatow, Kielce, Poland on 12/03/1941

Transport No. 5 departed on March 12, 1941 from Aspangbahnhof in Vienna (Wien), destined for Opatow and Lagow, two towns in close proximity to each other and located about 50 kilometers east of Kielce in the Lublin district. According to available documentation, this transport consisted of 992 Jews and comprised men, women and children. 414 of the deportees were older than 61 years. The average age of the deportees was 53. On arrival in the General Government, the deportees were transferred to local trains and continued their journey in open freight cars. The towns designated to accommodate the deportees had not been prepared in advance and they were housed in large buildings, such as stables, in which sanitary conditions were very poor. In addition, there was a constant shortage of food. At this stage, the families were not separated from each other. In July 1941, young men from the Vienna transport were sent to forced labor, which entailed road building and paving, quarry work and working in motor and engine manufacturing plants. The Opatow ghetto was liquidated between October 20 and 22, 1942, and 6,000 of its residents were sent by train to the extermination camp in Treblinka. About 500 – 600 Jews were sent to the Sandomierz forced-labor camp. Hundreds were murdered during the liquidation. Several dozen Jews were forced to clean the ghetto and sort the belongings left behind. Then they were shot in the ghetto cemetery. Of this transport from Vienna to Opatow and Lagow only 11 Jews survived the Holocaust. In mid March 1941, Gestapo head Heinrich Mueller, notified the Central Office for Jewish Emigration in Vienna that the transports were to be stopped due to fierce opposition by the German rulers in the General Government, as well as increased military preparations for Operation Barbarossa, Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union. This development led to other "resettlement"-plans being called off by the General Government.