Author Description

Presents 149 letters from the Ringelblum Archives. They were sent from various places, mostly ghettos and labor camps outside of Warsaw, to family and friends in the Warsaw ghetto. All the letters were written in 1942 and give information, sometimes cryptically, about the mass murder of Jews or the fate of many Jews. Part of them are addressed to the Judenrat and contain requests for information about the address or fate of somebody, mainly a member of the family. Six letters were thrown out from the train during the transport of Płońsk Jews to Auschwitz. Most of the letters were written in Polish or Yiddish, some of them in German. Includes facsimiles. Pp. xi-xxix contain the editor's preface, dealing with the figure of Emanuel Ringelblum and the story of the "Oneg Shabbat" organization and its archives.