ARG I 434 (Ring. I/234).
Description: duplicates (two copies), handwritten (two types of handwriting: a) ink; b) pencil), Yiddish, 147x208 mm, 3 sheets, 3 pages.
Edition based on duplicate (a), 1 sheet, 1 page.
According to Emanuel Ringelblum, the author of this account was Majlech Sztajnberg, printer, activist of the Left Po’ale Zion, cf. Kronika getta [The Ghetto Chronicle], p. 485.
[1] In February 1941, as everyone knows, Jews were deported from Żyrardów,686 which happened under harsh conditions. The deportees were allowed to take only 25 kilos of luggage; no wonder, then, that they were looking for opportunities to transport their belongings through unofficial routes. This was the reason for my imprisonment.
As a foreigner, I was allowed to travel by train,687 so one of the deportees asked me to go to Żyrardów, to collect a package with linens and a fur coat he had left with some Christian woman, and bring it to him to Warsaw. I agreed. I arrived there without problems. [2] I collected everything without difficulty, put the fur coat on, picked up the package, and, satisfied with myself, went to the station. Meanwhile, a Pole who had some beef with the Jewish owner of the package found out about the whole thing (I have no idea how) and reported me to the station commander, saying that I was carrying Jewish belongings. The commander, a German, summoned me, ordered me to present my documents, and when I showed him my foreign passport, said: “You can go, but you mustn’t carry Jewish things.” Because I insisted that the package was my property (he had no suspicions about the fur), I was
