Siedliszcze is a town in eastern Poland, some 56 kilometers southeast of Włodawa. According to the census of 1921, it was home to 724 Jews, out of a total population of 944.[1] On September 18, 1939, following the outbreak of World War II and the invasion of Poland by Germany and the Soviet Union, Red Army troops entered Siedliszcze. They held the town for only a few days, and then withdrew.[2] While the borders between the Soviet and the German occupation zones in Poland were being finalized, some of the local Jews crossed over into Soviet-controlled territory. The town fell under the control of Nazi Germany and became an administrative part of the Chełm County (Kreis) in the Lublin District, within the newly formed entity known as the General Government (Generalgouvernement), encompassing the Polish territory that had been occupied by Germany, but not annexed to the Reich.
In December 1939, a Jewish Council (Judenrat) was established in Siedliszcze. Local resident Sarah Hermann recalls that the Jews were driven out of their homes and confined to a limited area in the town.[3] From March 1940, local Jews were used in forced labor camps. In March 1941, a transport of Jews from the city of Lublin was distributed among towns in the Lublin District, and some of the deportees ended up in Siedliszczce. The Jewish Council in Lublin reported that the Jewish population of Siedliszcze numbered 1,276 in November 1941.[4] On May 12, 1942, a transport of 780 Jews (516 women, 104 children, and some 160 elderly men) from the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia arrived in Siedliszcze. After this transport, the town's Jewish population swelled to approximately 2,056 people.[5]
On May 18, the Nazis carried out the first deportation of Jews from Siedliszcze to their deaths at the Sobibor extermination camp. On October 22, 1942, the Jewish community of Siedliszcze ceased to exist. On that day, SS units came over from Chełm and declared Siedliszcze judenrein (free of Jews). Eight hundred Jews were deported to the Staw labor camp, 20 kilometers eastward, while all the others were deported to the Włodawa Ghetto, and thence to Sobibor.[6] Zelda Metz and Regina Zielinski were on the transport to Staw. The Jews made the trip in horse-drawn wagons, with little luggage allowance.[7] At the camp, they were forced to work for two months, until December 21, at which point the camp was dissolved, and all the Jewish inmates from Siedliszce were either loaded onto 150 horse-drawn wagons or force-marched on foot to Sobibor, some 36 kilometers north of Staw....