TRANSFERSTELLE (German: Transfer Office), the office which, from December
1940, controlled the trade in goods between the ghetto and the “Aryan side”. Until
May 1941, the Transferstelle was part of the Department of Deportations (German:
Umsiedlung), then subject to the Office of the Commissioner for the Jewish Housing
District (i.e. the ghetto).
WACHA (German: Wache—guard post, sentry post), guard unit at the gates of the ghetto
(the “outlets”). It consisted of the so-called Gendarmerie (Schutzpolizei), a municipal
formation of the German Order Police. From the outside, it guarded and escorted units
of the blue police along the walls of the ghetto, and the Jewish Police on the inside.
WARSAW GHETTO—officially called The Jüdische Wohnbezirk (German: Jewish residential
district)— the largest Jewish ghetto in Nazi-occupied Europe. It was established
on 2 October 1940 and sealed on 15 November1940. The ghetto comprised an
area of 3.4 km2 (1.3 sq mi) and at its peak held 460,000 Jews. They lived in immensely
overcrowded conditions, and were ravaged by starvation and illnesses. The liquidation
of the Warsaw ghetto began on 22 July 1942, when over a two-month period approximately
280,000 ghetto inhabitants were deported to the Treblinka death camp. The
last chapter in the history of the Warsaw ghetto was the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising,
which broke out on 19 April 1943 and was the largest Jewish revolt of World War II.
The suppression of the Uprising and the destruction of the Great Synagogue of Warsaw
on 16 May 1943 marked the end of the ghetto. Thereafter its remaining buildings
were razed to the ground.
WORK DETAIL (Polish: placówka), forced labour sites located outside the ghetto in
Warsaw, for example in factories and at train stations. Work at such facilities was
very exhausting physically, and workers were often subject to beatings. At the same
time, however, going to a work detail involved leaving the ghetto, which for some people
was an opportunity for smuggling.
WORKSHOP (Polish: szop), a German company that had taken over smaller Jewish
companies and manufactured products for the Germans. The first workshops were
opened in the Warsaw ghetto in 1941. The largest of these, Walther Többens’s workshop,
employed 18,000 people.
YIKOR (Jewish Culture Organization), clandestine group founded in December 1941
in the Warsaw ghetto to promote Yiddish language and culture. It supported underground
schools held concerts, theatre prefomances and lectures.
