With episode 25, we conclude the series "The Taste of Ghetto Life" by Agnieszka Witkowska-Krych, initiated in March last year, in which the author explored, among other things, the issue of feeding the ghetto's inhabitants, the activities of ad hoc feeding points for starving residents, and the Transferstelle, a kitchen feeding children and infants.
The author tells the story of the courthouses, which served as a transit point for food smugglers, Janusz Korczak's efforts to obtain aid for the Main House of Refuge, the so-called house committees, and the people and institutions that had to face the nearly impossible task of feeding the poor and saving them from starvation. We publish columns on our website weekly. We invite you to read this challenging book, based on a diverse and solid source base.
Warsaw-born Bogdan (Dawid) Wojdowski, who as a teenager found himself in the Warsaw Ghetto, in his moving novel "Bread for the Dead," based on facts and his own experiences, paints a picture of hunger for the inhabitants of the closed district: "The first days of hunger are the worst, then it becomes bearable. First comes weariness, arms and legs feel heavy, every word grows into a painful clamor in the ears. The colors do not please the eyes, and the light hurts them. (...) One is constantly thirsty, cracked lips dry up. The jaw clenches of its own accord, and a pain erupts behind the ears at the sight of a tin spoon abandoned on the table. Then thoughts of food begin, terrible, exhausting fantasies. The stomach works like a siphon. The thought of a piece of turnip is enough for him, and his teeth crunch through the fibrous pulp, and the juice, faintly reminiscent of black turnip, milder in taste and sweetish, flows down his throat and moistens the swollen tongue, leaving a tart residue in the mouth. (...) The thought breaks away from the turnip and soars high. "When will they bring that bread?" (1971, pp. 24-25).
Bread – the object of desire for tens, hundreds of thousands of people crammed into a small area carved out of the so-called Northern District. The vast majority of whom died of hunger, disease, and exhaustion during the deportation operations and in the Treblinka extermination camp. Food: in the ghetto, alongside those craving bread and dreaming of turnips, there were also those who dined at the "L'Ourse" café, and the "Gazeta Żydowska" of August 1, 1941, reported that the kitchen at 11 Leszno Street "will distribute candy for adults and an additional 50 grams for children." This, however, does not change the overall picture of a place where obtaining food was a matter of paramount importance – a condition for, though not a guarantee of, survival.
Prof. Konrad Zieliński, head of the research department of the Warsaw Ghetto Museum
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The railway siding at Gdański Station, a transshipment yard with a ramp and warehouses, was taken over in 1940 by the Transferstelle, an institution coordinating the ghetto's exchange of goods with the outside world (Jacek Leociak, "Views of the Warsaw Ghetto. Stawki," Warsaw 2011, p. 21). Official food shipments mainly reached the Warsaw Ghetto through this route, which was later distributed through distribution shops to residents. However, this location gained infamy when, in July 1942, it became a transshipment yard not so much for goods as for people being transported—as official reports had it—eastward to work.
During the initial period of deportation, those volunteering to leave were promised provisions for the journey—bread and marmalade. For starving people who saw their future in the ghetto as bleak, this was an extremely effective argument, facilitating the decision to pack their essentials and report to the Umschlagplatz to await their departure for work. The vision of long-unseen and uneaten bread firstly provided a false sense of at least momentary satiation, and secondly, it offered an illusory guarantee that the Germans would care for those leaving and, above all, not waste so much food. Not everyone, however, believed the propaganda promises. Henryk Makower wrote years later: "During that terrible time, this led to the terrible phenomenon of people voluntarily volunteering to leave in exchange for a loaf of bread and a kilogram of marmalade. These people believed they were going to a labor camp and had great hopes of survival. I saw these tragic figures with bundles (you were allowed to take fifteen kilograms, but no problems were caused; if someone took more, the bundles were later taken away) walking alone towards the Umschlagplatz, sometimes entire families, beguiled by the charm of bread and marmalade. It was a heartbreaking sight. […] However, these people were relatively few. The vast majority, poor and rich, old and young, healthy and sick, thought with horror about the possibility of deportation and made every possible effort to save themselves" (Henryk Makower, Memoirs of the Warsaw Ghetto , Wrocław 1987, p. 58). Today, one might wonder whether the people who voluntarily reported to the Umschlagplatz acted foolishly, that they might have saved their lives if they had stayed in the ghetto a little longer and then somehow escaped, that perhaps the promised provisions for the journey deceived them and clouded their ability to realistically assess the situation. However, it's difficult to judge the choices of others when one hasn't experienced prolonged hunger and a longing for even a slice of stale bread.
Marysia Szapiro wrote after the war that bread truly was worth its weight in gold: "I came home, no one even looked around, no one whispered, no one asked if I'd brought anything, even though I had two loaves of bread with me. Back then, having a loaf of bread was such a blessing, and they weren't happy at all. I understood that they were grieving for their [recently deceased] mother, so I put the bread on the table and started crying with them. Each of us was now waiting calmly for death" (ŻIH Archives, file no. 301/6545). Marysia Szapiro's eldest sister, Estera, after managing to get her younger siblings beyond the ghetto walls, decided to voluntarily report to the Umschlagplatz herself. No longer feeling responsible for her family and wanting to finally, if only for a moment, satisfy her hunger with the promised bread, she decided to go to Treblinka with other Jews from the Warsaw ghetto.
Agnieszka Witkowska-Krych is a cultural anthropologist, Hebraist, and sociologist. She is a renowned researcher of the life and legacy of Janusz Korczak and a collaborator with the Forum for Dialogue Foundation and the Center for Yiddish Culture. In December 2019, she received one of the KLIO awards in the competition for best historical book for "Less Fear. Facts and Myths about the Final Journey of Janusz Korczak and His Protégés."
Photo: Umschlagplatz (public domain)
