Postcard from Sosnowitz

Authors

Object ID

2015.2.110

Object Name

Postcard

Date

4-7-1942

Files

Content Warning

The Bulmash Family Holocaust Collection consists of images, documents, and artifacts related to the Holocaust. The collection contains materials that depict a number of topics that may be difficult for viewers to engage with, including: antisemitic descriptions, caricatures, and representation of Jewish people; Nazi imagery and ideology; descriptions and images of German ghettos; graphic images of the violence of the Holocaust; and the creation of the State of Israel. For more information, see our policy page.

Description

Front: Tan postcard with writing in blue cursive ink. Black stamp along the length of the bottom. Front: Red printed postcard lines with writing in black cursive ink. Includes a purple hand stamp on the lefthand side from the Council of the Elders of the Jewish Community in Sosnowitz, four black circular hand stamps on the righthand side, and several purple, red, and black numerical hand stamps along the bottom. One printed red stamp and pasted brown stamp in the upper righthand corner, and a blue pasted stamp on the lower lefthand corner. Some pencil markings in the bottom right corner.

Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:

Deutsche Reich 15 pfg censored postcard with additional 10 pfg tied Sosnowitz 4/7/1942. Three-line cachet citing the council of elders of the Jewish community in Sosnowitz. Sosnowitz had a substantial Jewish community prior to the German occupation. As the Germans resettled Jews from the smaller local communities, the Jewish population of Sosnowitz swelled to 45,000. The terror campaign against the Jews - shootings, mass executions, forced relocation, etc. - eventuated in the formation of the Ghetto. The establishment of the Judenrat, headed by Moishe Merin, a labor camp, followed. Merin headed the Central Office of the Jewish Council of Elders in upper Silesia, which represented approximately 45 communities. The population of the ghetto was culled periodically for labor and extermination, but the ghetto was finally closed in 1943 with the deportation of Jews to Auschwitz. An underground resistance was organized in Sosnowitz and staged an unsuccessful uprising against the Germans.

Dimensions

4 1/4 x 5 3/4"

Keywords

Stamp, Sosnowitz, Ghetto, Judenrat, Central Offce of the Jewish Council of Elders, Silesia, Auschwitz, Lisbon, Portugal, Mechel Schwarcbaum, Merin Moishe, Merin Moshe

Subcollection

Ghettos

Recommended Citation

"Postcard from Sosnowitz" (1942). Bulmash Family Holocaust Collection. 2015.2.110.
https://digital.kenyon.edu/bulmash/199