Transport from Stuttgart, Stuttgart (Stuttgart), Wuerttemberg, Germany to Auschwitz Birkenau, Extermination Camp, Poland on 12/10/1943

On 21 May 1943, Rolf Guenther, Adolf Eichmann’s deputy in the Department for Jewish Affairs and Evacuation (Department IV B4), informed all local police headquarters that Heinrich Himmler required the completion of all deportations of Jews from the Greater Reich and the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia to the East and to Theresienstadt by 30 June 1943. The new regulations included several groups of Jews whose deportation had been postponed until then. These were the sick and the infirm, Jews who were still employed in slave labour for the war industry, and employees of the "Reichsvereingung der Juden in Deutschland" (Association of Jews in Germany). The only exemptions were Jews married to non-Jews. The regulations also gave guidelines regarding the procedure of the deportations. In the case of smaller deportations of up to 400 Jews, special cars, connected to regular trains, were to be used. Due to the lack of archival records, no information is available regarding this transport that left from Stuttgart to Auschwitz on October 12, 1943. Since the Jewish community had officially been dissolved by June 30, the deportees were most likely arrested by the Gestapo and taken to a local police station. While they waited for their deportation they underwent registration and a search, a process which was often accompanied by violent assault. They had to endure bureaucratic procedures and were forced to declare their assets before undergoing the final stages of expropriation. Their declarations of property were collected and they were informed that because they were “enemies of the Reich” their assets had been seized. They were also forced to hand over all valuables and cash to the Gestapo officials who were present. In accordance with regulations, armed policemen guarded the deportees throughout the journey to Auschwitz. Their further fate is not known. It can be assumed that they were murdered in the gas chambers immediately upon arrival.