Small Riga Ghetto

34
War 1941 – 1945
The Germans March into Riga
The sudden declaration of war by Fascist Germany against Soviet Russia (on
22 June 1941) had a very great impact on Riga. In the very first days one saw
that the enemy was advancing rapidly. Although the Soviets issued a decree
that nobody was permitted to leave his or her place of work – which meant
that Riga would be defended – this did not give people any feeling of reassurance.
On the contrary, the Latvians sabotaged all the decrees and created the
well-known "fifth column". It was all the more astonishing that during the first
few days two well-known Jews of Riga, Nison Trubek (director of the Delka
Company) and the engineer Kagan (of the Jessen family), were shot for being
members of this fifth column. This was clearly an act of revenge by the Latvians.
In the meantime, the Soviets moved the German and Austrian Jews out of
Riga in order to transport them to Russia. These were the same people who
had previously been gotten out of Germany with great effort through the skill
of Mordechai Dubin. At the time, these persecuted people had received a
warm welcome in Riga and found a pleasant home waiting for them. Now they
suffered an especially tragic fate, for to the Germans the Jews were Jews and
to the Soviets the Jews were Germans. Later, the transport to Russia turned
out to be a stroke of luck for those who were affected, for thanks to Soviet
power many of them survived.
The Latvians fought on all fronts; they shot from the roofs and attics of their
houses at the units of the Red Army that were in retreat. In the meantime,
German planes could already be seen dropping bombs on the city's outskirts.
On the radio we heard that Kovno (the capital of Lithuania) had been occupied
by the Germans. The Lithuanian partisans were fighting just as the Latvians
were. Every person one met had just one question: "What should we do?"
There was no official evacuation, but a few trains were standing in the station.
Understandably, they were stormed by a crowd of people, but for most of
these people it was impossible to leave by train. Moreover, people said that the
enemy was bombarding the trains, railroad stations and railway tracks, so it
was impossible to get through. The city of Daugavpils, they said, was already
occupied by the Germans and so only the stretch toward Valka-Pskow-
Leningrad was open. Many Jews who got no seats in the trains came back
from the railroad station. Others halted trucks and begged the drivers to take
them along. On the way, many drivers demolished their vehicles on purpose
and then disappeared. A large portion of the civilian population was also taken