In a town of 450 Jewish families, on 1 September 1939, before the first
bomb fell on our town, the Jews from Łódź, Tomaszów, and so on, started wandering through our town. This lasted a few days until the 6th. On 6 September,
the bombing of the town began, during which 10 Jews [and] 8 Christians fell.
The Jews began to flee en masse from the town to the villages, cemetery, and
so on. At the same time, they fled from all the other towns. On Friday, another
small push from both sides took place; and Yom Kippur, that is on Saturday,¹¹⁵⁸
our enemy entered the town. As the Jews were hidden in the bet hamidrash
and the cemetery, first of all they went to the cemetery and [then] into the
rebbe’s bet hamidrash. All the men were taken out, led by the rabbi;¹¹⁵⁹ over
a hundred men, and all of them had to take off their hats and clothes, throw
them into the trenches, and were then ordered to fill the trenches with their
hands. The rabbi had to throw in his shtrayml and a silk kapote. While filling
the trenches, all received blows and were thoroughly beaten, and then
all had beards cut off. That lasted the entire Yom Kippur, until night-time.
And then, they made the rabbi responsible for everybody presenting themselves
for work the following day; otherwise they would be shot. Then they
began to set fire to the town, because a Pole had fired.¹¹⁶⁰ People were forbidden
to save themselves. In the home of Dovid Kaufman, Yosef Nusbaum was
burnt, Yosef Wajnrajch, and his son, Hershl, aside from 20 men from Łódź
[who were] passing through. Yosef Wajnrajch was shot because he wanted to
save himself from the fire.
On Monday, the Jews came to work, where they were fiercely beaten,
and further forced to fill the trenches with their hands. On Sunday evening,
[2] the grandson of the miller, Itshe Zasławski, was forced to set fire to
the synagogue and the bet hamidrash. Before that, he had to take out the
Torah scrolls, placed them in a pile, and set them on fire; and as they did
not burn, they doused them with petrol, and told the grandson to ignite it.
1158 The date here is Saturday 9 September 1939, Yom Kippur was two weeks later; perhaps used as a metaphor.
1159 Probably a reference to Yaakov Dovid Kalisz (1906–1942), the tzaddik of the Mszczonów dynasty.
1160 An accidental fusillade ensued on the night of 9–10 September, probably between drunken German soldiers, one of whom died. The Germans put the blame on the town inhabitants and in retaliation they executed several families and set fire on houses, one by one.
