Small Riga Ghetto

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Šķirotava railroad station, but after that they were released. This was the reason
why many of our doctors remained in the ghetto and the concentration
camp, but unfortunately only a few of them survived.
In the meantime, the prison gradually filled up with Jews who had simply
been arrested on the street for various "sins" (because they were not wearing
their stars, and so on). Even Jewish members of the Red Army, including
high-ranking officers, were put into prison (Nowosjolok, for instance). Sick
and wounded men were dragged directly from the army field hospitals into
cells, where they then lay without treatment until they died. After the liquidation
of the ghetto it was the turn of the "baptized" Jews (the Kalabus family
and others) and those who had been living with Aryan identity papers (the
lawyer A. Blankenstein and others). For a long time Blankenstein wore a crucifix
in prison, but this did him no good at all. Foreign Jews with passports
from Persia (Gluchowski), Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay and the USA were also
imprisoned, together with their wives and children. They too were killed.
Even the aforementioned "Swedish group" (the lawyer Jewelsohn, Dr. Freidmann,
F. Sacharow and others), who had tried to escape to Sweden and were
betrayed at the last moment by an SD man, were put into prison. Folia Sacharow
and the policeman Bruno Goldberg, who was a familiar figure in the
ghetto, were separately imprisoned for a long time in a veritable cage. Later
on they were killed.
After the large-scale "weapons incident" in the ghetto, many people were
taken to prison from the ghetto and from their place of work. These were the
last and best of our young people. My comrade Dreier, who had been saved by
chance, told me that after even a short time in prison he had not recognized
people any more. They had long beards and could barely stand upright. Every
day dysentery killed a huge number of people, but there was no help for it.
At this time the prominent industrialist Niemirowski was also in prison, and
he was saved by an accident. The only Jew who lay in the prison infirmary for
more than a year was the mentally deranged lawyer Liebesmann. To get bread,
the Jews sold their last possessions to the prison guards, and for this reason
they walked about dressed only in their underwear. Everyone tried to survive
by any possible means. One day it was announced that if anyone had buried
valuables in the ghetto and would voluntarily surrender them, he would be released
from prison. Those who volunteered were driven with Gestapo people
into the ghetto to dig up the malines (hiding places). Many valuables were dug
up and handed over; but this was of no use at all, for nobody was released for
doing so. The only lucky one to be released was the rag merchant Dubrow, but