The Germans treat the Jews of Skidel well. They even allowed a Jew, Mr Shulman, to continue as manager of his factory, which they had taken over. The Jews suffer greatly at the hands of the local Poles, who torment them at every turn. In Skidel we were very well received. Thanks to the intercession of Mr Shulman, we travelled from there to Grodno in a factory car.
In Grodno, Jews wear yellow patches on their front and back. Jews are not allowed to walk on the pavement. They have to walk in the middle of the road with the horses and cattle. They are expecting a ghetto to be formed any day. Nevertheless, the situation there is not too bad, thanks to the incessant large levies which the local Jews keep paying.
In Grodno too, we were very well received. The Judenrat provided us with food, drink, and a place to sleep, and gave us some money. [36a] From a fixer we obtained two przepustki in Polish names for 350 roubles apiece. We set off from Grodno on the road to Białystok. Twenty kilometres outside Grodno we asked Germans in a passing truck whether they would give us a lift. Thinking we were Poles, they did so and dropped us off in Sokółka.425
The ghetto in Sokółka was sealed, so we didn’t go in, fearing that wewould not be able to get out so easily.
We went to the sołtys, pretending to be Poles. He gave us somewhere to sleep and something to eat. The sołtys’s wife and daughter spoke harshly of the Jews.
Many local Poles had been expelled by the Russians, so there was ter-rible antisemitism, because the Poles considered that this was the workof the Jews.
