For centuries Jews had been concentrated in specified areas of many European cities, segregated from the surrounding population. They were often required to wear identifying items such as yellow badges or pointed hats. The Third Reich built upon this religious and antisemitic impulse of European ghettoization, creating a ghetto system based on an eliminative racial ideology. Jews were no longer merely persecuted, terrorized, and denied their civil rights and loss of their ability to earn a living. Now they were to be herded like cattle into overcrowded enclosures typically surrounded by fences, walls and barbed wire, denied access to the basic necessities of life, exploited for their labor, and subject to starvation and disease: all as a preliminary step to what the Nazis considered the solution to the "Jewish problem." The specific form of this solution went through several iterations, from mass emigration to plans to ship Jews to Madagascar or to Siberia. Confining Jews to ghettos began in earnest after Germany invaded Poland in September 1939 and 3 million Jews fell into their laps. Reinhard Heydrich had proposed establishing ghettos near railway lines in large Polish towns, with Jews from the smaller villages as well making up the ghetto population, in the effort to centralize Jews for a presumptive "final solution." Jews would be employed as slave laborers. A counsel of Jewish elders - a Judenrat - would be formed to do the bidding of the German occupation administration, ensuring that initiatives and regulations would be carried out. Jewish "police" were to ensure maximal compliance with Nazi orders, including readying Jews for slave labor or deportation. Conditions were execrable: overcrowding, starvation, disease, and exposure to the elements created high death rates. While this scenario wasn't the much-vaunted Final Solution the Nazis struggled with, it served to contribute to Jewish death without Germans taking full responsibility; indeed, the self-serving Nazi idea that Jews were disease carriers would prove to be a self-fulfilling prophesy by virtue of their living conditions alone. After operation Barbarossa and the invasion of the Soviet Union, millions more Jews came under Nazi control, at which point deportation and extermination of Jews in all German-occupied territory became the most obvious and desirable solution to the Jewish problem. At Hermann Goering's request, Heydrich chaired the conference at the Wannsee villa in the Berlin suburbs in January 1942 to coordinate this decision with other Nazi elite. Adolf Eichmann sat quietly taking notes which would be euphemized and sanitized for public consumption.
--Michael D. Bulmash, K1966
Browse the Bulmash Family Holocaust Collection.
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Receipt from Krakow Ghetto
2014.1.142
A white slip with a typewritten message, including a red hand stamp and signatures in green and black.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash: : In the occupied territories of Poland, the various Jewish welfare organizations that had existed before the war continued under the aegis of the Judische Soziale Selbsthilfe (Jewish Self-Help; JSS), the legal entity that essentially absorbed their functions, and was an important anchor during these times. The directorate of JSS, headquartered in Krakow, included representatives from ghettos throughout the General Government and maintained continuous contact with all Jewish communities. The financial resources allotted to the JSS by the German authorities -- extremely modest compared to their needs -- helped ghetto inhabitants operate soup kitchens and warehouses, as well as provide medical aid.
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Receipt from Wisnicz Nowy Ghetto
2014.1.143
A white slip with a typewritten message, including purple and red hand stamps, as well as signatures in black and blue ink.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash: In the occupied territories of Poland, the various Jewish welfare organizations that had existed before the war continued under the aegis of the Judische Soziale Selbsthilfe (Jewish Self-Help; JSS), the legal entity that essentially absorbed their functions, and was an important anchor during these times. The directorate of JSS, headquartered in Krakow, included representatives from ghettos throughout the Generalgouvernement and maintained continuous contact with all Jewish communities. The financial resources allotted to the JSS by the German authorities -- extremely modest compared to their needs -- helped ghetto inhabitants operate soup kitchens and warehouses, as well as provide medical aid.
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Abuse in Kielce Ghetto
2014.1.145
A black and white photograph of men running naked in the snow, with clothed Germans at the center.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash: Jewish men forced to run naked from the bathhouse into the snow. Prior to the German occupation of Kielce in September 1939, there were 24,000 Jewish inhabitants. Immediately after the occupation, Jews were subject to fines, confiscation of property, forced labor, deportation to concentration camps, and murder. A Jewish ghetto was established in Kielce in 1941, and Jews were forced to move into it. Many of them were conscripted into forced labor at a nearby German ammunition plant. In August 1942, the liquidation of the Jewish ghetto began, and in 5 days 22,000 Jews were murdered. Those who survived the massacre were sent to another forced labor camp before going to Treblinka.
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Abuse in Kielce Ghetto
2014.1.146
A black and white photograph of men running naked in the snow.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash: Jewish men forced to run naked from the bathhouse into the snow. Prior to the German occupation of Kielce in September 1939, there were 24,000 Jewish inhabitants. Immediately after the occupation, Jews were subject to fines, confiscation of property, forced labor, deportation to concentration camps, and murder. A Jewish ghetto was established in Kielce in 1941, and Jews were forced to move into it. Many of them were conscripted into forced labor at a nearby German ammunition plant. In August 1942, the liquidation of the Jewish ghetto began, and in 5 days 22,000 Jews were murdered. Those who survived the massacre were sent to another forced labor camp before going to Treblinka.
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Postcard Sent to Radom Ghetto
2014.1.147
Front: Tan postcard with green printed postcard lines and stamp. Includes writing in black ink, as well as black, red, and purple hand stamps.Back: Message written in black ink.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
Incoming correspondence to Radom Ghetto bearing Radomsko/Postabteilung (Elders of the Community) cachet in violet. Addressed to Jakob Wajsberg, a member of the Jewish community in Radom. Written by Josef Bloch, a member of the Skala Podolska Jewish community.
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Postcard Sent to Radom Ghetto
2014.1.148
Front: Tan postcard with green printed postcard lines and stamp, writing in black ink, and purple and black hand stamps.Back: Message written in black ink.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash: Incoming correspondence to Radom Ghetto bearing Radomsko/Postabteilung (Elders of the Community) cachet in violet. Addressed to Jakob Wajsberg, a member of the Jewish community in Radom. Written by Natan Appel, of the Jewish community of Biala Podlaska.
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Postcard Sent to Radom Ghetto
2014.1.149
Front: Tan postcard with green printed postcard lines and stamp, writing in black ink, and a black hand stamp.Back: Message written in black ink.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash: Incoming correspondence to Radom Ghetto bearing Radomsko/Postabteilung (Elders of the Community) cachet in violet. Addressed to Jakob Wajsberg, a member of the Jewish community in Radom. Written by Josef Bloch, a member of the Skala Podolska Jewish community.
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Postcard Sent to Radom Ghetto
2014.1.150
Front: Tan postcard with green printed postcard lines and stamp, writing in blue ink, and red and black hand stamps.Back: Message written in black ink.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash: Incoming correspondence to Radom Ghetto bearing Radomsko/Postabteilung (Elders of the Community) cachet in violet. Addressed to Jakob Wajsberg, a member of the Jewish community in Radom. Written by Josef Bloch, a member of the Skala Podolska Jewish community.
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Postcard from Sieniawa Ghetto in Russia-Occupied Poland
2014.1.152
Front: Tan postcard with orange printed postcard lines with Russian text. Includes an orange printed and green pasted postage stamps, writing in blue, black, and purple ink, and black and blue hand stamps.Back: Message written in blue ink.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
A postcard from April of 1941, less than two months before the town was overrun by the Nazis and turned into a ghetto. There is no record if the author, a Polish Jew named Moses Sandbank, survived the Holocaust, as Sieniawa and its surroundings lost the lion's share of its archive documents during the war. The San River, which flows in Sieniawa's vicinity, was a traditional frontier line between conflicting sides during World War I, and the river served as a border between Austria-Hungary and Russia. It was also along this river that Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany divided their spheres of influence in 1939, as had been agreed in the secret meeting between Ribbentrop, Molotov and Stalin, held just before the outbreak of World War II. Sieniawa, because of its ill-fated location, was bound to suffer first in hostilities. Shelled three times over a period of twenty years, a place similar to this can hardly be found on the map. Each time the town was razed to the ground its inhabitants learned how to survive in the ruins. During the Holocaust the Jews from the vicinity were driven to the Sieniawa ghetto and shut off behind a three-meter barbed wire fence. One day the Nazis announced that they needed people to work. In doing so, they wanted the Jews to turn up of their own accord. The wagons driven by the local peasants took the Jews in two different directions: some of them went to the nearby concentration camp and place of executions in Pelkinie; the others were taken to the nearest train station and from there transported to the gas chambers of the Belzec death camp. In 1942, when the ghetto went into liquidation, the German and Ukrainian militia went from door to door, murdering those who managed to survive. The dead bodies were heaped on wagons and buried at the back of the Jewish cemetery. Many people were hiding themselves in the area. Some of them even dug burrows underground; they extended the cellars in their homes and used them as hide-outs. After some time they were caught, however, especially by the Ukrainians, who turned out to be particularly overzealous informers. One Polish witness stated: "I remember the Ukrainian village leader who, one Sunday, on the way to church, went to the police and denounced a Jewish woman that had been spotted in town. The horde of policemen chased her and shot her in the fields." After the liquidation of the ghetto, the Jews who survived and tried to hide themselves were caught and shot at the cemetery. In many cases, however, they were executed and buried on the spot. Sieniawa abounds in such places. Surviving Nazi records indicate a complete liquidation of the Jews from the town of Sieniawa by 1943.
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Censored Envelope from Bendsburg, Poland
2014.1.155
Front: An off-white envelope with writing in blue and black ink and two pasted stamps of Adolf Hitler in profile in green and blue. Includes black, red and purple hand stamps, as well as a white and red pasted stamp.Back: Writing in black ink, several black and purple hand stamps.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
The Bendsberg Ghetto was among the first to be liquidated by the Nazis on August 1, 1943. This cover is stamped with the Jewish ghetto administrations stamp. Alfred Schwarzbaum was a wealthy Jew from Bendzin who escaped to Switzerland and conducted relief and rescue work for Jews in occupied Poland, as well as supporting armed resistance by Jews in the ghettos. On the envelope, he is referred to as Treue (“ever-faithful”) because of his support for Jews trapped in ghettos.
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Receipt Issued by the Judischer Handwerkerverband (Jewish Craftsmen Association) in the Ghetto of Radom
2016.1.43
Pink, “Judischer Handwerkerverband” printed at top left.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
This receipt was issued for 25 zlotys on August 16, 1941. Radom was occupied by the Germans in September 1939. The ghetto was established by March 1941. The ghetto was liquidated between August 1942 and July 1944, with approximately 30,000 Jews conveyed by cattle cars to the infamous extermination center Treblinka. The brutal SS leader Fritz Katzmann was in charge of operations in Radom until Operation Barbarossa.
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Peysya Farberman's Identification Document from Ukrainian Police
2019.2.18
"Jarasi Hivatal Kamiens Podolsk" printed in upper left corner, black print on tan paper, writing in purple, marked with blue stamp in center.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
A printed document issued by the Ukrainian police in 1941 under Nazi occupation, identifying Peysya Farberman as an artist on the street, “Uchbat” (likely meaning “ghetto”?), and identifying him as Jewish.
Farberman was a young Ukrainian Jew living in Kamianets Podilskyi during the early German occupation of the town. Farberman’s fate is unknown, but Kamianets Podilskyi was the site of an early massacre by the Nazis shortly after the commencement of Operation Barbarossa in 1941.
Jeckeln’s Einsatzgruppen and Police Battalion 320, along with Ukrainian Auxiliaries, slaughtered in two days close to 24,000 Jews from the town along with 16,000 Jews removed from Hungary. The killing of Jews continued through 1942, and in November of that year they murdered 500 children by burying them alive in the cemetery. The last of the Jews were murdered in the winter of 1942 to 1943.
[Related items: 2019.2.16, 2019.2.17, 2019.2.19]
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Photograph of German Soldiers Marching Through Piotrkow Trybunalski Ghetto in Poland
2021.1.14
Group of soldiers walk through the streets of a Jewish Ghetto with a skull and bones sign visible in the foreground.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
Piotrkow Trybunalski was the first ghetto established by the Germans 38 days after the invasion of Poland on October 8, 1939. A ghetto sign with skull and bones is clearly visible. This period photograph was removed from a soldier’s album.
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Dr. Lasch Broadside on the Establishment of the Lvov Ghetto
2021.1.116
Three columns of the same text, each in a different language -- German, Ukrainian and Polish. Dr. Lasch at bottom right of each column.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
Approximately 220,000 Jews were living in Lvov in eastern Poland – at the time in the Soviet occupation zone – when the German Army Group South and Einsatzgruppe C invaded in June 1941 as part of Operation Barbarossa. Ironically, half were refugees fleeing eastern Poland after the Nazi occupation. Almost immediately, a number of German-inspired and encouraged pogroms occurred by Ukrainian nationalists in which 6,000 Jews were murdered. This broadside addresses the establishment of the ghetto in Lvov. The name appearing on this document is that of Dr. Karl Lasch, German governor of the province of Galicia, and friend and protégé of Hans Frank who is the head of the General Government in German-occupied Poland. Lasch and Fritz Katzmann, higher SS and Police Leader, were involved in the establishment of a “Jewish residential quarter” – a Judischer Wohnbezirk - in an area of the suburbs known as Zamarstynow, a wretched slum in the northern part of the city of Lvov. Jews were to be given little more than one month to move into this area. Conditions were wretched for the more than 111,000 Jews forced to live here. Extreme overcrowding, poor sanitation, lack of heat, and hunger from markedly diminished food rations contributed to many Jews dying of typhus. Selections occurred almost immediately. The sick and elderly were murdered even before they entered the ghetto. Many Jews were deported to the Aktion Reinhard extermination camp Belzec – so named for Reinhard Heydrich, who died of his wounds after an assassination attempt – where they were instantly murdered. Jews deemed less expendable were forced to work at the Janowska labor camp. In August 1942, the so-called Great Aktion occurred and approximately 50,000 more Jews perished at Belzec. These Aktions continued on the orders of Katzmann and included shootings and hangings. Members of the Judenrat were not spared and were hanged in public. With the final dissolution of the Judenrat, the Ghetto was renamed Judenlager Lemberg, a forced labor camp for Jews working for German war industries.
[Related items: 2012.1.577, 2012.1.579]
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Censored Postcard From Bialystock to Palestine
2014.1.272
Front: Tan postcard with red printed postcard lines and text. Includes writing in black ink, one purple and two black hand stamps.Back: Message written in black ink.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
A postcard sent months before the German invasion of Belarus in June 1941. The sender appears to live in Horodyszcze, close to Minsk and Lida, and in the general vicinity of the Bielski family in the Western Belarus. Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941. By the end of August 1941, they were in control of both Eastern and Western Belorussia. Communists and intellectuals were killed, and close to 400,000 young people were forced into slave labor. Homes were requisitioned, and many starved due to food shortages. The Nazis launched a series of actions in which Einsatzgruppen units, with help from the Belorussian police battalions, as well as units of Lithuanian and Ukrainian police, murdered forty per cent of the Belorussian Jews. Shot over pits, they were buried in mass graves. There were two waves of these actions; the first lasted from July to December of 1941, and the second from the spring through winter of 1942. In Eastern Belorussia, Germans conquered Minsk, Vitebsk, and Smolensk by July 1941. Again, Jews were murdered en masse and by the end of 1942 the Jews of 35 ghettos had been exterminated. While 30,000 Jews were murdered over a three-day period in July 1942, Minsk Ghetto, one of the largest ghettos in WWII, lasted until October 1943. The Bielski brothers, who came from Stankiewicze near Lida and Nowogrodek, built a family camp in the forests of Western Belarus, saving the lives of more than 1200 Jews. The group spent more than two years in the forests.
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Envelope from Kaunas to Riga with Russian Stamp
2014.1.231
Front: A tan envelope with writing in blue ink. Includes a blue postage stamp and two black hand stamps.Back: One black hand stamp.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash: This cover is dated five months before the German occupation of Lithuania.
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“Israel” Postcard sent from Przemysl in Poland, then under Russian Control
2012.1.293
Tan postcard addressed to Marc Oeurelstr with blue postcard lines. Includes a handwritten message.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
Przemsyl is home to almost 67,000 Jews at the time this postcard is written. Under the terms of the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact, it is controlled by Russians after the end of September 1939. When Germany attacked Soviet Union in June 1941, the Pact with the Soviet Union was broken; and by June 28, under German occupation, a Judenrat is established within a week. By mid-July the ghetto is established. Thus this postcard was written just four months before Operation Barbarosa commenced.
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Adoption Request from Litzmannstadt
2014.1.120
White paper with a printed form letter including a purple hand stamp and signature.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash: Werner Ventzki approves the adoption of three Studzinski children by Janina Cekus (Morowska) signed by the Mayor of the Lizmannstadt Ghetto, Werner Ventzki. Ventzki was mayor of Litzmannstadt from May 1941 to August 1943.
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Photograph of Peysya Farberman
2019.2.17
Black and white photograph of young man in a collared, dark shirt.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
A photo marked “Moscow” verso with date March 22, 1941, tucked inside passport.
Farberman was a young Ukrainian Jew living in Kamianets Podilskyi during the early German occupation of the town. Farberman’s fate is unknown, but Kamianets Podilskyi was the site of an early massacre by the Nazis shortly after the commencement of Operation Barbarossa in 1941.
Jeckeln’s Einsatzgruppen and Police Battalion 320, along with Ukrainian Auxiliaries, slaughtered in two days close to 24,000 Jews from the town along with 16,000 Jews removed from Hungary. The killing of Jews continued through 1942, and in November of that year they murdered 500 children by burying them alive in the cemetery. The last of the Jews were murdered in the winter of 1942 to 1943.
[Related items: 2019.2.16, 2019.2.18, 2019.2.19]
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Koden Ghetto in the Lublin District Ghetto Envelope
2015.2.102
Front: Cream-colored envelope with black writing. Rectangular purple hand stamp in upper right. Pasted rectangular stamp on lower right, with a black hand stamp over it.Back: One purple, one orange, and six green pasted stamps. Black circular hand stamp on lower right.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
Large registered envelope sent locally with violet handstamp "Koden uber Biala Podlaska (Distrikt Lublin)" registered label plus manuscript "Judenrat in Koden" postmarked verso Biala Podlaska April 8, 1941. Koden is a village in eastern Poland on the River Bug, in Biala Podlaska county in the Lublin district. At the time it was seized by Germans in September 1939, there were less than 300 Jews living in the town. Refugees from Krakow settled there in 1940. In 1942, all the Jews from the Koden ghetto were relocated to Miedzyrzec Podlaski from where they were deported to Treblinka. The Germans destroyed the synagogue and the cemetery.
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Envelope from Dzikowiec Ghetto
2015.2.142
Green envelope with writing in black cursive ink. Includes purple and black hand stamps, and two green pasted stamps in upper right depicting a piazza with a statue in it.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
Envelope postmarked May 11, 1941 Rzeszow franked General Government with violet circular date stamp JUDENRAT DZIKOWIEC RAD ZYDOWSKA and boxed DZIKOWIEC uber Rzeszow alongside. Dzikowiec was a small shtetl a few miles north of the regional capital of Rzeszow, connected with the Jews of neighboring shtetlach and sharing cultural, academic, social and economic interests: cemeteries, butchers, bakers, etc.
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Postcard from Warsaw Ghetto to the USSR
2012.1.514
Postcard with message written in Polish. Includes purple printed postcard lines.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
A postcard from the Warsaw Ghetto addressed to Bobrojsk, USSR. A 30GR General Government postcard from mother named A. Zak to her children; written in Polish and has boxed red 'Judenrat Warschau' Jewish censor mark at upper left. Translation: "Dear children your packages, letters & cards received here, thanks.... We try to reply weekly, hope you are receiving our mail... Please write often, you are our sole source for news... We are well, but could be better... We have just met Mania, Avram & Josek, also saw grandmother, she is here, and well, do try to send us some tea... I still have hope, kisses to you all..." The card was delayed by censor and cancelled Warschau 6.V.41; Nazi circular censor H/S at front; Russian receiving CDS 16.5.42 also at front. Six weeks later, the Nazis invaded the USSR.
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Correspondence from Aron Appelbaum via British Red Cross
2014.1.201abc
A British Red Cross envelope with a form and separate note. Sent in 1941 by Aron Appelbaum in Tel-Aviv in an attempt to communicate with his brother-in-law Beer Eisik in Berlin, utilizing the British Red Cross and the Order of St. John in Palestine.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash:
Aron Appelbaum in Tel Aviv attempting to communicate with his brother-in-law Beer Eisik in Berlin in February 1941, utilizing the British Red Cross and the order of St. John in Palestine.
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Litzmannstadt Ghetto Notice Signed by Chaim Rumkowski
2014.1.117
Tan paper with typewritten information, three purple hand stamps and a signature.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash: "Agreement on the resettlement of Jews to the General Government." Official document with the signature and seal of the Eldest of the Jews in the Ghetto Litzmannstadt Chaim Mordechai Rumkowski. Lodz Ghetto was liquidated in August 1944 and Rumkowski was taken to Auschwitz-Birkenau.
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Parcel Card from Siedlce, Poland
2015.2.118
Front: Tan paper with black printed text and dotted lines. Includes two pasted stamps on right side depicting a grey piazza. Includes several black hand stamps, writing in black, and a blue checkmark across the top. Back: Black printed text split into boxes. Includes purple, red and black hand stamps, as well as a purple pasted stamp of a church on the bottom middle.
Information Provided by Michael D. Bulmash: Parcel card franked General Gouvernement 60 pfg pair tied SARNAKI 6/5/1941 cds with boxed "Sarnaki uber Siedlce" alongside, red boxed Judenrat cachet on reverse. The village of Sarnaki was approximately 27 miles from Siedlce, a major city with a significant Jewish presence in Poland for centuries. By 1939, Jews constituted almost 40 percent of the population. In 1940 Germans exiled Jews from elsewhere in Poland to Siedlce. In August 1941 Jews from Siedlce were herded into Siedlce's ghetto. In August 1942 deportations commenced with 10,000 Jews being deported to Treblinka. This Aktion was to be followed in November by another, when the remaining Jews were also exterminated.