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Statement

Copied from the original statement signed by Mrs. Ruth Morgensternová, residing in Brno, Na ponávce 10

former prisoner in the Bergen-Belsenconcentr. camp and a labor camp in Estonia

Transport Be Theresienstadt - Estonia.

I. IX. 1942 departure from Theresienstadt, direction Riga. The journey went well; the escort was decent. The train stands in Riga for a day and then rides on to Estonia. After a five-day journey, the train stops 25 km from Tallinn in Raasiku. The SS and SD, with beautiful, blue buses, are waiting for us there. We stand in front of the train and one SSman selects the young people who will apparently be walking. The rest are told to put away their luggage and step onto the bus. We’ve heard no news of them since. We, the young ones (75 women and about 150 men), leave on trucks with all of the luggage from the transport to the nearby JAGALLA camp. It’s a camp in the middle of a forest, with old, broken down buildings, surrounded by a barbed wire fence. The Lagerführer is an Estonian SDman; his adjutant a Baltic German. The guards are Estonian. Our valuables and extra clothes are taken away on the first evening (body search). The next day, our clothes are returned. Three days later, they lead us to large buildings where we unpack and sort the items from our transport. The men, whom we glimpse from far away, are sent to work in the forest. Only the sick return to us, and they are sent away, allegedly to Dorpat, where there is an infirmary. Supposedly, the rest of the transport is there, but we never heard from any inhabitant of Dorpat that there were Jews there. Women are treated well; men fare far worse, especially when they work outside, where the Estonians rob then and don’t give them anything to eat. The food is not bad; connection to the outside world is impossible. In October, another transport arrives from Germany (Frankfurt and Berlin). Once again, luggage and some of the people go to Jagälla. In December, a large transport of women leaves for Revala (Tallinn) and supposedly to Dorpat (only the older and sick). The rest of the women (there are 45 of them and almost all are Czech) move into very nice buildings. After their work in Schleuse is done, the women go to the forest to chop down trees and tear down old buildings. The work is very hard. In August 1943, the rest of the women leave for Tallinn; the camp is liquidated. Before we leave, most of our things are taken away from us. In Tallinn, we live in the central prison, where we meet up with the first transport, and work together doing cleaning work in the port under the supervision of the OT. Here, we see the men from our transport who also return to the prison after their work is done. The food in prison is terrible, but we can sometimes procure something for ourselves.

In December 1943, all of the women leave Tallinn and go to EREDA (about 30 km from Narva). The men remain in Tallinn, and this is where we last hear from them in March 1944. Ereda is a small camp. It already houses about 1,000 Jews from Lithuania (Vilnius and Kovno) and Latvia. They are lice-infested and without their belongings. In the surrounding area, there are several other similar camps. There are also several Czechs there, arriving from Riga. The SS has already taken leadership of it; guards are Est. and O.T. The food is bad, but we have the option to obtain things for ourselves, but only the fearless among us attempt this. We work in the forest and on the construction of a new camp a few km away. There is typhus; there are sick people; the elderly and children are constantly sent away (most likely to Auschwitz). When the Russians approach (in July 1944), we depart for Tallinn, where a boat is supposed to be waiting for us. It’s not there, and so we go to a suburb of Tallinn to a large meadow, where we stay for three weeks with no shelter. We dig trenches. There is famine in the camp. In August, we finally sail to Germany. We sail for five days without food. We arrive in Danzig and sail down the Vistula to Stutthof. There, we are sent to the baths, our belongings are taken away, and we are given new clothes. Our hair was already cut before we left Estonia. Women who are capable of working leave for Hamburg after three weeks to work in a munitions plant. From there, we are evacuated in April 1945 to Bergen-Belsen,

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where we remain until liberation.

Signature:

Schicková

Statement copied by:

Helena Schicková

copied from the original statement

Signature of witnesses:

B. Gerzonová

Accepted on behalf of the documentation campaign: Scheck

On behalf of the archive: